Spontaneous Regression By: Donald H MacAdam

Spontaneous Regression By: Donald H MacAdam


full book, hardcopy, order page:

http://www2.xlibris.com/bookstore/bookdisplay.aspx?bookid=20887

Excerpt PDF:
http://www.mbvax.com/pdf/Book_Excerpt.pdf

Free Publishing | Self-published Book Author Probes Cancer Regression By Boosting Up Immune System
Tuesday, January 11th, 2011

Cancer regression by boosting up human immune system is investigated by Donald H. MacAdam in his book Spontaneous Regression: Cancer and the Immune System, released by the book publishing company Xlibris.

Recent studies showing that advanced cancer treatments damage immune systems and pose great risk on the patient's survival prompted MacAdam to self-publish his study.

MacAdam revisited the hundred-year old immune therapy for cancer done by William Coley, a young New York doctor who encountered a case of spontaneous regression following an accidental infection when he injected a terminally ill patient with a virulent strain of bacteria.

The patient suffered an attack of the infectious disease for more than a week but the cancerous tumors began to break down and entirely disappeared within a few weeks after the infection subsided.

The advancement of chemotherapy in the 1950s and the discovery of fast-acting radiation therapy at the turn of the century make Coley's invasive cure for cancer fade away.

Medical journals, however, publishes thousands of apparently incurable cases of cancer that spontaneously regressed without any medical treatment and bares the power of the human immune system in restoring a cancer patient's health.

MacAdam's published book recounts the history and promise of different cancer treatments using non-technical language and looks into the roles of genetics, diet, lifestyle, infection and power of the mind in the development, prevention and spontaneous regression of the dreaded disease.

MacAdam is a self-published book author and holds top positions in more than twenty companies in different industries including biotechnology.

His book is available in Xlibris, a self-publishing company and a leader in the industry.

About Xlibris

Xlibris was founded in 1997 and, as the leading publishing services provider for authors, has helped to publish more than 20,000 titles. Xlibris is based in Philadelphia, PA and provides authors with direct and personal access to quality publication in hardcover, trade paperback, custom leather-bound, and full-color formats.


We have all heard stories of apparently miraculous recoveries from terminal cancer, but are any of these accounts true? Absolutely. Medical journals have published thousands of case histories about seemingly incurable patients who have seen their cancers disappear in the absence of medical treatment. These examples of spontaneous regression demonstrate the power of the human immune system. It can cure cancer.

In recent years cancer survival rates have improved, but a related statistic has worsened. While patients are surviving longer, a person is more likely to die from cancer today than fifty years ago. The increase in mortality rates is in part due to cancer treatments introduced since 1950 that damage the immune system. To reverse this trend, new treatments are needed that stimulate the latent power of the immune system. This sounds like cutting-edge science, but the first immune therapy for cancer is more than one hundred years old. Even more surprising, this historical therapy is considered the equal of modern cancer treatments in terms of five-year survival, and superior in terms of long-term cure.

In 1891, a young New York doctor named William Coley encountered a case of spontaneous regression following an accidental infection. In the belief that a deliberate infection might also induce the body to rid itself of cancer, Coley injected a terminally ill patient with a virulent strain of bacteria. The patient suffered an attack of infectious disease lasting more than a week. By the time the infection subsided, the cancerous tumors had begun to break down and within a few weeks the cancer had entirely disappeared.

In an age when most doctors practiced surgery, Coley's minimally invasive therapy had many detractors. Others considered the new therapy impractical because it was most effective when treatments continued for up to a year or more. With the introduction of fast-acting radiation therapy at the turn of the century, the use of Coley's therapy became even less popular, and with the rise of chemotherapy in the 1950s, the first cancer therapy that induced the power of the immune system all but vanished.

From the perspective of the immune system and in non-technical language, the author describes the convoluted history and future promise of cancer treatments, and explores the roles of genetics, diet, lifestyle, infection and the power of the mind, in the development, prevention, and spontaneous regression of cancer.


Spontaneous Regression By: Donald H MacAdam
ISBN10: 1-4134-2751-0 (Trade Paperback)
ISBN13: 978-1-4134-2751-6 (Trade Paperback)
ISBN10: 1-4134-2752-9 (Trade Hardback)
ISBN13: 978-1-4134-2752-3 (Trade Hardback)

Pages : 160
Book Format :Trade Book 5.5x8.5
Subject :
HEALTH & FITNESS / Diseases / Immune System


Spontaneous regression: a hidden treasure buried in time
S. A. Hoption Cann,1,2,3 J. P. van Netten,1,2 C. van Netten,3 D. W. Glover1
1
  Special Development Laboratory, Royal Jubilee Hospital, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada; 2Department of Biology, University of Victoria, Victoria, British Columbia, Canada; 3Department of Health Care and Epidemiology, University of British Columbia, Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada

Summary

 Spontaneous tumor regression is a phenomenon that has been observed for hundreds, if not thousands of years. Although the term spontaneous implies `without apparent cause', a review of case reports over the last several hundred years demonstrates that regression generally coincides with acute infections. Observations of this non-specific effect led to the emergence of active cancer immunotherapies by the 1700s. By the 1890s, William Coley refined this approach with a bacterial vaccine which, when administered properly, could induce complete regression of extensive metastatic disease. Unfortunately, after Coley's death, his vaccine and technique fell into obscurity.
     Modern approaches to treatment have reduced the occurrence of spontaneous regressions. Aseptic techniques and antibiotics significantly reduce postoperative infections, while chemotherapy and radiation impair immune activation even when an infection does occur.


=====================


                                        Chapter Two
                                            Coley
In 1999, a group of researchers compared cancer patients treated by William Coley with
contemporary cancer patients and reached the following conclusion: "Given the
tremendous advances in surgical techniques and medicine in general, any cohort of
modern patients should be expected to fare better than patients treated 50 or more years
ago. Yet no such statistical advantage for the modern group was observed in this study."1
In 1891, Dr. William Coley plunged a syringe into the neck of a young Italian man and
carefully injected a solution of infectious bacteria. This particular type of bacteria was
known to cause a skin disease called erysipelas. At the time, long before the discovery of
antibiotics, erysipelas was often fatal even in a healthy person. But the young Italian man
was not healthy. He was terminally ill with cancer. Coley's intention was to produce
erysipelas in the hope the patient, while recovering from the skin disease, would also
recover from cancer. It was an experiment. But, as is often the case in medical research,
there was an unforeseen problem. The first injection, then the second, then the third,
failed to produce an infection. But Coley persisted, time after time injecting the young
man with bacteria but repeatedly failing to infect him. Finally, after four months without
success, an injection of a particularly virulent strain did the trick. Within an hour, the
typical symptoms of a severe attack of erysipelas appeared. There was pain, nausea, a
chill lasting forty minutes, and a fever that rose as high as 105°. The attack of erysipelas
lasted for more than one week. By the time it subsided, the tumors had begun to break
down, and within weeks the tumors had disappeared.2 The young man returned to his
home in Italy where, ten years later, he died of unknown causes.3
The young Italian man was only the second cancer patient treated by Coley. He had
treated his first patient less than a year before. Bessie, a teenager from a prominent
family, had bone cancer in her right hand. The year was 1890. Radiation had not been
discovered, chemotherapy had not been dreamt of, and the only medical treatment for
cancer was surgery. Coley did everything that could be done when he amputated Bessie's
arm beneath the elbow but, as is so often the case with cancer, everything that could be
done was not enough. The following month, lumps appeared in her breasts and lymph
nodes, and Bessie was in constant, debilitating pain that could only be managed with
increasingly larger doses of morphine. In her next and final month, more nodules
developed, more lymph nodes hardened, Bessie's enlarged liver turned her skin yellow
from jaundice, and the cancer filled her abdominal cavity and covered her skin from head
to foot. Unable to tolerate solid food, her condition steadily declined. With the young
doctor at her bedside, death finally brought relief.4
Coley was painfully aware that surgery was rarely effective except when the cancer could
be completely removed and the patient was in good physical condition, but this was
exactly such a case. Bessie was healthy and her cancer was confined to the extremity of a
limb. Her death had a profound impact on Coley. If the fact that his surgical skills had
proven useless in this one case was troubling, the knowledge he was not equipped to face
the next case was even more so.
The medical schools of the late nineteenth century, even the great ones like Harvard from
which Coley graduated in 1888, taught much about anatomy, bone-setting, surgery and
diagnosis, but very little about the treatment of disease. By today's standards, diseases
usually went untreated. Other than morphine to dull pain, there were very few available
medications. Ailments were either self-limiting or incurable. To the nineteenth century
physician, his or her role was to perform practical doctoring and, when there was nothing
practical to be done, to diagnose disease and to explain its probable course, positive or
negative. It was all that could be expected. But Coley wanted to do more. In a personal
campaign to find something that might help the next Bessie, Coley researched about 100
similar cases treated at the New York Hospital during the previous 15 years.5 He found
nothing out of the ordinary except for a peculiar incident involving a German immigrant
named Stein that had occurred seven years previously.
In 1884, the 31-year-old Mr. Stein had undergone an operation to remove a cancerous
growth from his neck. It had been his fifth operation in three years and, for the fifth time,
it proved impossible to remove the entire tumor. And there was more bad news to come.
After two weeks confined to his hospital bed recuperating from the ineffective surgery,
Mr. Stein contracted a dangerous skin disease called erysipelas. He experienced high
fever, chills, nausea and pain, then, as the skin disease began to subside there was a
second attack. Once more Mr. Stein was racked with fever, chills, nausea and pain, until
finally, the second attack of erysipelas gradually came to an end. It was at this point that
the attending physician, Dr. Bull, witnessed an extraordinary event. During the resolution
of the skin disease, the wound from the operation healed along with all visible traces of
the tumor. Shortly thereafter, Mr. Stein was discharged from the hospital.6
After this remarkable incident, there was no further mention of Mr. Stein in the records of
the hospital, not even a follow up examination. After five surgeries in three years, the
most reasonable explanation for the extended absence was that he had died, but no one
knew for sure. Coley set out to discover what happened to Mr. Stein. Even today, it is
difficult to reconstruct a patient's history seven years after the fact, but in 1891 it must
have seemed an impossible task. Nonetheless, Coley searched New York's immigrant
neighborhoods for someone with knowledge of Mr. Stein's ultimate fate. Then, in his
own words, "After great effort I finally succeeded in tracing the after-history of this
patient and found him alive and well." Coley persuaded Mr. Stein to accompany him
back to the New York Hospital where he was examined by Coley and Dr. Bull. No trace
of the cancer remained.7
The only clinical factor that distinguished Mr. Stein's case from the others was the
erysipelas infection. To Coley, it seemed obvious that the accidental infection must have
somehow cured the cancer. If so, Coley reasoned, then an intentional infection might also
have curative effects. Coley decided to act on his intuition. He resolved to purposely
induce an attack of erysipelas in his next appropriate cancer patient. It would be
something like fighting fire with fire and, in researching the bacterial cause for this new
kind of fire, Coley found there were others who had come to the same conclusion before
him.
In 1867, a German professor named Busch wrote what is likely the first account of an
attempt to cure cancer by intentionally infecting a patient with erysipelas.8 Busch applied
the used bandages of an erysipelas patient to the neck of a 19-year-old female patient
with a child-head-sized tumor. The young woman contracted erysipelas, her temperature
rose to 104°F, and the huge tumor shrank to the size of a small apple within two weeks.
After the erysipelas infection was cured, the tumor grew back and the woman left the
clinic to an unknown fate.9 In 1882, a German scientist named Fehleisen was the first to
identify, isolate and culture the bacteria responsible for erysipelas.10 Fehleisen injected
the live cultured bacteria into seven cancer patients and achieved remissions in three of
them.11 As mentioned earlier, remission has a different meaning than regression. Tumors
in a cancer that is in remission have stopped growing, and tumors in a cancer that is in
regression are becoming smaller either in number or size. In total, Coley found more than
20 published accounts before 1890 linking infections of erysipelas to remissions or
regressions of cancer.12
In May 1891, Coley conducted his first erysipelas experiment with the young Italian man
described at the beginning of this chapter as his patient. By the following year, he had
treated a total of ten "inoperable and quite hopeless" cancer patients, but continued to
find it difficult to produce an erysipelas infection. After his initial success with the Italian
man, Coley was able to induce an attack of erysipelas in only two out of his next nine
cancer patients. In these two successfully infected patients, the cancerous tumors entirely
disappeared in one and reduced in size and number in the other.13 These results were very
encouraging because every patient who contracted erysipelas showed remarkable
improvement. However, most patients did not contract the disease and there could be no
therapy without the disease. Coley needed a more efficient method of infecting patients,
and perhaps he found one because the next two consecutive patients were successfully
infected. But then there was a setback. Both patients died, but not from cancer. They died
from erysipelas.
The consecutive fatalities forced Coley to rethink his strategy. He needed an alternative
method to deliver the beneficial effects of erysipelas without the necessity of producing
the disease itself. Coley suspected the anticancer activity of his treatment was not the
result of the skin disease erysipelas, but rather due to an unknown component of the
bacteria that was "toxic" to the cancer. If so, it might be possible to treat patients with
killed bacteria. That way the patient would receive the benefit of the anticancer toxin
without the necessity of contracting an often-fatal skin disease. These thoughts, more
intuitive than scientific, led Coley to abandon the use of live bacteria and begin treating
patients with killed bacteria.
In the first version of "Coley Toxins," which despite the name are not poisonous, the
bacteria responsible for erysipelas were heat sterilized and passed through a porcelain
filter. This version was used in four cases of inoperable cancer but failed to generate the
intense symptoms such as chills and high fevers that had been observed in all successful
treatments. As an experiment, a revised version of Coley Toxins was prepared that
included a second type of killed bacteria known to generate intense reactions in rabbits.
Coley hoped the mixture of the two types of bacteria would generate a more intense and
therefore more beneficial reaction.14
The first patient to receive the mixed version of Coley Toxins was a sixteen-year-old boy
who was bedridden with an abdominal tumor measuring six by five inches in width and
about five inches in thickness. An exploratory surgery revealed the tumor to be
inoperable because it involved the entire thickness of the abdominal wall and was
attached to the underlying bones. A sample of the tumor was microscopically examined
and found to be cancerous. Over a period of four months, every few days Coley injected
his new mixed toxin directly into the tumor mass. On each injection, there was dramatic
rise in body temperature and extreme chills and trembling. The tumor gradually
diminished in size. At discharge from the hospital in May 1893 after four months of
intensive treatment, the tumor was a fifth its original size. Two weeks later, a small mass
could be felt but it was no longer visible. By August the remains of the growth were
barely perceptible. The boy returned to his regular work and received no further
anticancer treatment. He remained in very good health until he died suddenly of a heart
attack 26 years later.15
Between 1891 and 1896, Coley published 16 papers describing his method but his reports
did not generate widespread excitement. At the time, most physicians practiced surgery
and firmly believed there could be no cure for cancer other than surgery. Since it was
impossible for Coley's treatment to be successful, surviving patients must not have had
cancer in the first place. As one 1893 observer succinctly put it, "A cure by means other
than surgical is ... sufficient proof of a mistaken diagnosis."16 To most members of the
medical community, non-surgical approaches to the treatment of cancer were simply of
little interest. The medical journals in which Coley published, however, had a wide
readership. While most readers ignored Coley's articles, a number of independently
minded doctors began to make use of the new cancer treatment. Before the turn of the
twentieth century, at least 42 physicians from Europe and North America had reported
cases of cancer that had been successfully treated with Coley Toxins.17
Cancer therapies have improved since Coley's day, but improvements in treatment have
resulted for the most part in prolonging the disease rather than curing it. For example,
when an appeal for donations on behalf of the American Cancer Society claims, "Today,
far more than half of all cancers are curable,"18 it is referring to the fact that about 60% of
patients diagnosed with cancer during the period 1989-96 survived for at least five
years.19 According to the National Cancer Institute, the five-year survival rate includes
"persons who survive five years after diagnosis, whether in remission, disease-free, or
under treatment".20 This concept is far different than Webster's definition of cure as
something that "heals or permanently alleviates a harmful or troublesome situation."21
According to the National Cancer Institute, about 60% of cancer patients survive at least
five years after initial diagnosis compared to only 35% in 1950.22 The principal difficulty
with this kind of comparison is that the process of cancer diagnosis has improved over
the years. Many patients seem to be surviving longer simply because their cancers are
diagnosed sooner. Instead of dying in four years in the 1950s, an equivalent group of
cancer patients in the 2000s might be dying in six years. In these cases, the improvement
in survival is the result of better diagnosis, not better treatment. For example, in white
females resident in the United States, the five-year survival of breast cancer patients
during the period 1988-1997 was about 82% compared to only 64% in the period 1975-
1987. That appears to be a considerable improvement. However, during 1988-1997 about
63% of breast cancers were initially detected when the disease was confined to a primary
tumor compared to only 51% in the period 1975-1987.23 The 28% increase in five-year
survivability must be tempered by the fact that 24% more breast cancers were diagnosed
before they began to spread.
Earlier diagnosis is the most important contributing factor in the observed increase in
five-year survival rates. Only that portion of the improvement in survival rates that is
independent of time of diagnosis can be rightfully credited to modern cancer therapies.
The improvement in survival due to modern cancer treatments is small but we are
grateful for it. However, this improvement, encouraging as it might be, masks a
fundamental problem. Modern therapies have added some years to the life of the average
cancer patient, but modern therapies have not reduced the patient's chances of dying from
the disease. In fact, a resident of the United States is more likely to die of cancer today
(202.8 per 100,000) than in 1950 (195.4 per 100,000).24
The greatest value of Coley Toxins is evident through the experience of patients who
received the therapy. Rather than surviving additional years with cancer, many of these
patients lived the rest of their lives without cancer. For example, in December 1895 a
woman was diagnosed with inoperable cancer. She had a tumor the size of an orange in
her upper left breast that extended to a region under the clavicle and surrounded major
blood vessels. The woman was in a rapidly declining state of health and had lost 24
pounds in the previous six weeks. Her Connecticut surgeons administered 76 injections
of Coley Toxins over a period of three months and, as the tumor shrank in size, on nine
occasions incisions were made into it to facilitate the drainage of dead tissue. By the end
of three months of therapy, the tumor had entirely disappeared and the woman soon
regained her weight and her health. She lived a normal life and died of pneumonia in her
89th year, more than 47 years after diagnosis.25
Progress against cancer is calculated in terms of five-year survival after diagnosis. Five
years is an arbitrary, but practical, unit of measure. It might be more meaningful to
measure longer-term survival, but it would be impractical in terms of patient-tracking and
reporting delays. Doctors and patients want to know the expected performance of current
therapies, not the performance of historical therapies. In any case, the infrastructure that
would be needed to follow the long-term medical histories of cancer patients does not
exist. We must be content with an imperfect reporting system that makes no distinction
between patients who survive five years and patients who enjoy the remainder of their
lives without cancer.
Most patients with inoperable cancer do not survive even five years. However, even
before the turn of the twentieth century some patients with inoperable cancer went on to
live normal lives. In 1893, a 29-year-old woman noticed a small swelling on the left side
of her abdomen that rapidly increased in size. An exploratory operation found an
inoperable tumor involving much of the abdominal wall. Microscopic examination of a
tumor sample returned a diagnosis of cancer of the connective tissue. Toxin therapy was
begun the following month. Injections directly into the tumor were given daily for six
weeks and then, after a month of rest to allow the inflammation caused by the repeated
injections to subside, the therapy was continued for an additional month. Over the
treatment period the tumor steadily decreased in size to the point it was no longer
detectable. There was no trace of malignancy at the time of her death from heart failure in
1918, 25 years after diagnosis.26
After the death of her father in 1936, Helen Coley Nauts inherited her father's papers
including his diaries, medical reports, case files and a correspondence numbering many
thousands of letters. Her original intention was to write her father's biography but, after a
meticulous reading of the archive, she found her true vocation. For more than fifty years,
the daughter labored to "rehabilitate her father's reputation and revive use of the toxins in
modern medicine."27 Thanks to the relentless detective work of Helen Coley Nauts, we
now know that many of Coley's patients were long term survivors who went on to live
normal lives.
For example, even with the best modern treatment, widely spread cervical cancer is a
virtual death sentence with only 13% of women surviving five years after diagnosis.28
Yet, more than 100 years ago a 43-year-old woman with widely spread cervical cancer
recovered from the disease and went on to live a normal life. In her case, an exploratory
surgery revealed two growths, one on each side of the abdomen, attached to the small and
large intestines. No attempt was made to remove the tumors. Microscopic examination
confirmed a diagnosis of inoperable widely spread cervical cancer. The woman's son was
a doctor and he treated his mother at home. Coley Toxins were injected deeply into the
cancerous masses twice a week for six months, then once a week for a year. Each
injection resulted in a full reaction including high fever and the tumors slowly reduced in
size. By the completion of the first eighteen months of therapy, the woman was able to
resume her normal activities. After a period of rest, the treatments were resumed for an
additional eighteen months as a precaution against reoccurrence. An extended therapeutic
regimen is difficult both for the patient and the physician, but in the end it proved to be
worth the effort. The woman died of pneumonia in her 79th year, 36 years after
diagnosis.29
We owe this account to a son and a daughter. Without the son's dedication to provide his
mother with long-term therapy there would be no happy ending. Without Helen Coley
Naut's painstaking research into the ultimate fate of her father's patients, the happy
ending would be unknown. Sons and daughters, mothers and fathers; unlike dispassionate
medical statistics, cancer is very much a family affair and the most tragic cases, and also
the most heartwarming, are those involving children. There is the case of a nine-year-old
girl, bedridden in a Connecticut hospital, and unable to close her mouth. The marble-
sized tumor that distended her jaws could not be surgically removed. The only possible
treatment was toxin therapy. Injections were given twice weekly and on each occasion
the girl experienced high fever and violent chills. After two months, the tumor had
completely regressed and the patient was allowed to go home where she continued to
receive injections for an additional five months. The little girl grew up and remained in
excellent health. She was free from recurrence when last traced in 1953, more than 46
years after diagnosis.30
Coley Toxins therapy was usually administered in the patient's own home. Even one
hundred years ago, it was considered too expensive to tie up a hospital bed for many
months at a time. The Mayo Clinic, for example, would begin toxin therapy and then
discharge the patient into the care of a local doctor. In most cases, however, cancer
patients were never hospitalized at all. These patients relied entirely on their family
doctor. One such physician, Dr. Calkins of Watertown, New York, routinely treated his
cancer patients for a full year. He would give daily injections of Coley Toxins for six
months and then twice weekly for another six months. Using this technique, Calkins
achieved an 80% five-year survival over a 32-year period.31
Another family physician, Dr. Arthur Burns of Kentville, Nova Scotia, knew he had a
difficult case when a young woman's health unexplainably began to rapidly deteriorate.
He referred her to a large Halifax hospital where an exploratory surgery revealed a huge
mass of tumor attached to and growing outwards from her kidney. When microscopic
examination returned a diagnosis of widely spread kidney cancer, her condition was
considered hopeless. She was discharged from the hospital and returned to her hometown
on a stretcher. Dr. Burns administered injections of Coley Toxins for six weeks and on
each occasion her temperature rose to about 105°F. Her condition gradually improved
and she began to gain back weight. Four months after therapy began, she returned to a
normal, healthy life. When the woman was last traced in 1952, she was entirely healthy
40 years after diagnosis of widely spread kidney cancer.32
There are many more examples of desperately sick cancer patients who received a new
lease on life after receiving toxin therapy. An extremely sick woman with widely spread
ovarian cancer received fifteen months of toxin therapy beginning in 1916, and
completely regained her health until she died suddenly of a cerebral hemorrhage 20 years
later.33 A patient with recurrent melanoma received injections of Coley Toxins in 1902
and remained well without further recurrence for 41 years.34 A patient who had become
paralyzed due to a massive tumor involving the spine received injections for three months
in 1902, completely recovered, and lived a normal life without further recurrence for 42
years.35 A patient with egg-sized tumors in the neck and jaw, received six months of
toxin therapy in 1906 during which the tumors entirely disappeared without further
recurrence for 46 years.36 A patient with inoperable bone cancer received six months of
toxin therapy in 1909 and went on to live a normal life without recurrence for 42 years.37
During his career, Coley treated about one thousand cancer patients with comparable or
better results than the best treatments available today. However, Coley did not understand
how his therapy worked and therefore had no scientific model to guide its proper
implementation. He made changes in treatment protocol based solely on personal
observations. He learned it was necessary for patients to experience a strong reaction
including a high fever and chills in order to benefit from the therapy. He also learned
through experience that different patients required different amounts of toxin, so he
began with small doses, then gradually built up the strength until he observed the desired
reaction. Some of this dose-variable effect was due to the various preparations of Coley
Toxins available over the years. Each contained the same mixture of two killed bacteria,
but varied greatly in potency. In particular, the commercially available Coley Toxins
made by Parke Davis & Company between 1899 and 1951 were often of poor quality.38
Finally, after hundreds of patients and years of follow up, Coley learned that the therapy
must be continued for some months after apparent recovery or else there was an increased
risk the cancer would return.
These observations, perfectly sensible in hindsight, came slowly after years of
experience. By the time Coley appreciated the importance of quality control in the
manufacture of the toxins and exactly how they should be administered, he was nearing
the end of his career. There were few physicians willing to revisit an old therapy without
a satisfactory medical explanation, let alone one that required months of treatment and
constant surveillance, when radiation therapy was well understood and straightforward to
administer. After Coley's death in 1936, the use of the toxins gradually dwindled until by
the end of the 1950s, when chemotherapy was considered the anticancer treatment of the
future, Coley Toxins were almost, but not quite, forgotten.
In the United States, perhaps the last recorded use of Coley Toxins as a primary cancer
treatment occurred in the 1960s. In this case, a 69-year-old man with colon cancer that
had spread to his liver and lungs was in such a hopeless condition he was expected to
survive less than one week. As a last resort, a doctor in Oklahoma City administered
eight daily doses of Coley Toxins and each time the patient experienced the healing bouts
of high fever and chills. This period of treatment is far short of the amount of time
usually required to assure a long-lasting response. Nevertheless, one week after
completion of the toxin therapy, the man returned home, his weight and strength
increased, and complete regression occurred. The man was free of disease when last
traced eight years after receiving the toxin therapy.39
Perhaps the last recorded use of Coley Toxins as a primary cancer treatment anywhere in
the world occurred in China during the 1980s. An adult male had terminal liver cancer
involving large tumors in both lobes of the liver. The man received 68 injections of Coley
Toxins in 34 weeks. By the end of this course of treatment, all of the tumors had
completely regressed.40
The examples that have been described are but a small sample of the Coley Toxins cases
documented in the medical literature.41 These accounts are so compelling that readers can
be easily seduced into unwarranted conclusions about the efficacy of a forgotten therapy
more than one hundred years old. By themselves, Coley Toxins are not the cure for
cancer. To keep a reasonable perspective, it is useful to remember that about half the time
toxin therapy did not work. It can be argued that many of these failures were due to weak
versions of the toxins or improper administration, but a similar argument can be made for
the shortcomings of any cancer treatment. For whatever reason, Coley Toxins failed
about fifty percent of the time. In that respect, this historical therapy is no better than its
modern replacements. On the other hand, when Coley Toxins did work, more patients
went on to live a normal life or enjoyed longer periods of disease-free survival.
For example, of 896 patients treated with Coley Toxins in one retrospective study, 33 had
breast cancer. Of these patients, 13 had operable cancer that had not widely spread and all
13 survived at least five years. The remaining 20 patients had inoperable, widely spread
disease. Of these, 65% survived at least five years.42 In comparison, five-year survival of
women with widely spread breast cancer at Yale-New Haven Hospital was about 7% in
the 1920s and improved to about 15% in the 1950s.43 More recently, according to the
American Cancer Society, 20% of women diagnosed with widely spread breast cancer in
1989-1996 survived five years.44
As we have seen, Coley Toxins were a highly effective anticancer treatment. As we shall
see, Coley Toxins work by stimulating a powerful immune response. By itself, a
powerful immune response is sufficient to cure some cancers in some patients but cannot
cure all cancers in all patients. A powerfully stimulated immune system is only part of the
answer because cancer cells are frequently able to hide from the immune system. The
immune system cannot kill what it cannot see. The remaining part of the answer, training
the immune system to recognize hidden cancer cells, is the subject of ongoing research
that is beginning to yield tangible results. However, before we discuss the end of cancer,
we must start with its beginnings.
1
  Richardson MA, Ramirez T, Russell NC, Moye LA. Coley toxins immunotherapy: a retrospective review.
Alt Ther Health Med 1999; 5:42; comparison of 128 Coley cases with 1,675 controls from the official
registry of the National Cancer Institute.
2
  Coley WB. The treatment of malignant tumors by repeated inoculations of Erysipelas, with a report of ten
original cases. Am J Med Sci 1893; 105:487-511.
3
  Nauts HC. Bacteria and cancer – antagonisms and benefits. Cancer Surv 1989; 8(4):713-23.
4
  Hall, Stephen S. A Commotion in the Blood. London: Little, Brown and Company, 1997. An excellent and
readable account of Coley's life.
5
  Nauts HC. Bacteria and cancer – antagonisms and benefits. Cancer Surv 1989; 8(4):718; Coley WB. The
treatment of malignant tumors by repeated inoculations of Erysipelas, with a report of ten original cases.
Am J Med Sci 1893; 105:487.
6
  Coley WB. The treatment of malignant tumors by repeated inoculations of Erysipelas, with a report of ten
original cases. Am J Med Sci 1893; 105:487-8.
7
  Coley WB. Late results of the treatment of inoperable sarcoma by the mixed toxins of erysipelas and
Bacillus prodigiosus. Am J Med Sci 1906; 131:375.
8
  Busch W. Aus der sitzung der medicinischen section vom 13 November 1867. Berl Klin Wochenschr
1868; 5:137.
9
  Hobohm U. Fever and cancer in perspective. Cancer Immunol Immunother 2001; 50(8):391-6.
10
   Fehleisen F. Über die Züchtung der Erysipelkokken auf künstlichem Nährboden und die Übertragbarkeit
auf den Menschen. Dtsch Med Wochenschau 1882; 8:553.
11
   Hobohm U. Fever and cancer in perspective. Cancer Immunol Immunother 2001; 50(8):391-6.
12
   Coley WB. The treatment of malignant tumors by repeated inoculations of Erysipelas, with a report of
ten original cases. Am J Med Sci 1893; 105:487-511.
13
   Coley WB. Late results of the treatment of inoperable sarcoma by the mixed toxins of erysipelas and
Bacillus prodigiosus. Am J Med Sci 1906; 131:375-430.
14
   Ibid., p 378-9.
15
   Coley WB. Late results of the treatment of inoperable sarcoma by the mixed toxins of erysipelas and
Bacillus prodigiosus. Am J Med Sci 1906; 131:393-4; Nauts HC, Fowler GA, Bogatko FH. A review of the
influence of bacterial infection and of bacterial products (Coley's toxins) on malignant tumors in man. Acta
Med Scand Suppl 1953; 276:21-2.
16
   Nauts HC, McLaren JR. Coley toxins – the first century. Adv Exp Med Biol 1990; 267:483-500.
17
   Table of Successful Cases Treated by Other Surgeons: Coley WB. Late results of the treatment of
inoperable sarcoma by the mixed toxins of erysipelas and Bacillus prodigiosus. Am J Med Sci 1906;
131:422-8.
18
   American Cancer Society appeal for funding. Website of the Illinois State and University Employees
Combined Appeal, http://www.secaillinois.org/acs.hlm accessed December 17, 2002.
19
   Greenlee RT, Hill-Harmon MB, Murray T, Thun M. Cancer Statistics, 2001. CA Cancer J Clin 2001;
51:15-36.
20
   Understanding prognosis and cancer statistics. National Cancer Institute web site,
http://cis.nci.gov/fact/8_2.htm accessed December 17, 2002.
21
   Webster's Ninth New Collegiate Dictionary. Markham, Ontario: Thomas Allen & Son, 1989, p 316.
22
   Table I-3, SEER Cancer Statistics Review 1973-1999. National Cancer Institute website
www.seer.cancer.gov. Accessed April 2, 2003.
23
   Clegg LX, Li, FP, Hankey BF, et al. Cancer survival among US whites and minorities. Arch Intern Med
2002; 162:1985-93.
24
   Table I-2, SEER Cancer Statistics Review 1973-1999. National Cancer Institute website
www.seer.cancer.gov. Accessed April 2, 2003. These statistics, by the way, have been age-adjusted to
make today's numbers comparable with those of 1950; otherwise the increased chance of dying from
cancer would be even greater
25
   Nauts HC, Fowler GA, Bogatko FH. A review of the influence of bacterial infection and of bacterial
products (Coley's toxins) on malignant tumors in man. Acta Med Scand Suppl 1953; 276:27-8; Coley WB.
Late results of the treatment of inoperable sarcoma by the mixed toxins of erysipelas and Bacillus
prodigiosus. Am J Med Sci 1906; 131:398-9.
26
   Nauts HC, Fowler GA, Bogatko FH. A review of the influence of bacterial infection and of bacterial
products (Coley's toxins) on malignant tumors in man. Acta Med Scand Suppl 1953; 276:22-5.
27
   Quote from: Hall, Stephen S. A Commotion in the Blood. London: Little, Brown and Company, 1998, p
118. An excellent account of Coley's life.
28
   5-year survival in metastatic cervical cancer is 15% for white women and 7% for black women. Greenlee
RT, Hill-Harmon MB, Murray T, Thun M. Cancer Statistics, 2001. CA Cancer J Clin 2001; 51:34.
29
   Nauts HC, Fowler GA, Bogatko FH. A review of the influence of bacterial infection and of bacterial
products (Coley's toxins) on malignant tumors in man. Acta Med Scand Suppl 1953; 276:28-30.
30
   Ibid., p 39-40.
31
   Nauts HC, McLaren JR. Coley toxins – the first century. Adv Exp Med Biol 1990; 267:486.
32
   Nauts HC, Fowler GA, Bogatko FH. A review of the influence of bacterial infection and of bacterial
products (Coley's toxins) on malignant tumors in man. Acta Med Scand Suppl 1953; 276:59-61.
33
   Ibid., p 75-7.
34
   Nauts HC, McLaren JR. Coley toxins – the first century. Adv Exp Med Biol 1990; 267:488.
35
   Nauts HC, Fowler GA, Bogatko FH. A review of the influence of bacterial infection and of bacterial
products (Coley's toxins) on malignant tumors in man. Acta Med Scand Suppl 1953; 276:30-2.
36
   Ibid., p 40-2.
37
   Ibid., p 51-3.
38
   Ibid., p 93-6.
39
   Nauts HC. Bacteria and cancer – antagonisms and benefits. Cancer Surv 1989; 8(4):718-9.
40
   Ibid., p 720.
41
   A critical analysis of 30 inoperable cases treated with Coley Toxins: Nauts HC, Fowler GA, Bogatko FH.
A review of the influence of bacterial infection and of bacterial products (Coley's toxins) on malignant
tumors in man. Acta Med Scand Suppl 1953; 276:1-103; also see extensive list of references in: Wiemann
B, Starnes CO. Coley's toxins, tumor necrosis factor and cancer research: a historical perspective.
Pharmacol Ther 1994; 64(3):529-64.
42
    Nauts HC. Bacterial pyrogens: beneficial effects on cancer patients. Biomedical Thermology 1982; 690.
43
   Todd M, Shoag M, Cadman E. Survival of women with metastatic breast cancer at Yale from 1920 to
1980. J Clin Oncology 1983; 1(6):406-8.
44
   By race, 22% of white and 15% of black women with metastatic breast cancer survived five years.
Greenlee RT, Hill-Harmon MB, Murray T, Thun M. Cancer Statistics, 2001. CA Cancer J Clin 2001;
51:15-34.