JM: I guess what I’d like to put before you is a scenario of an adult person who has been diagnosed with cancer and is about to have chemotherapy. The patient is really concerned about the awful side effects of chemotherapy – and wants to know how you can help?

DW: I think this is not a straight-forward proposition; there is not one answer to that question. Some medical oncologists are opposed to any use of complementary medicines (CM) when one is doing chemo/radiotherapy even though there is no evidence of contraindications. Some oncologists are very open to complementary practices – to the use of complementary medicine while taking chemo- and/or radiotherapy. I always work with medical oncologists when I can. Evidence suggests that CM is effective and when prescribed correctly, brings many benefits.

It is critically important that people don’t self-prescribe – you need to see someone who has some qualifications  Google Scholar, which looks at peer reviewed articles or books and they give a clear information. Better still. Ask whomever is treating the patient to clearly explain what evidence is behind their suggestions.

Historically the Chinese have been doing what we laboratory to test isolates and cancer with regard to efficacy. In China, medical oncologists and herbal oncologists work closely together to support the patient in the process. We are seeing that I think, increasingly, in other parts of the world. Sloan-Kettering hospital in NYC, and also M.D. Anderson in Texas that has a full-time complementary staff that looks at how the patient can get the best result for their cancer. The movement towards integrative oncology is gaining recognition.

JM: So, you would recommend having these tests done before prescribing any herbal medicine or supplements?

DW: Oh, absolutely! You have to – you can track the efficacy of your treatment, otherwise you are just operating blind. Just reading some anecdotal information that a substance is good for some condition is really not science it’s just superstition. Need to test and review

JM: So, are any of these tests done routinely by the oncologists?

DW: Many are being done yet many are being overlooked. There are many laboratory tests, which may indicate issues in what we call the tumor micro-environment. The TME is vitally important in treating not just the cancer but underlying issues that may contribute to cancer initiation, development and metastasis

JM: Can these tests be done by naturopaths and Traditional Chinese Medicine practitioners, or only by medical practitioners?

DW: In many countries a medical doctor needs to submit pathology requests, this is mainly for insurance or medicare. For example, the erythrocyte sedimentation rate (ESR) is critical. If I have a patient with prostate cancer and I always look at the ESR, serum amaloid A (SAA) and hs-CRP because, which will show chronic inflammatory patterns.

JM: Are there any kind of general tests that you would perform for most patients? Are there any particular considerations, for example the age and health of the patient, the type of cancer, are these things crucial?

DW: Absolutely, there are upwards of about 200 plus kinds of cancer, and every cancer has to be treated differently. For example, I often find in younger women, that ER negative tumors tend to be more aggressively inflammatory, and so they are treated differently than somebody who’s got an estrogen positive tumor and 74 years of age

JM: That seems to be your main message: there is a lot you can do, but don’t treat yourself with limited knowledge and resources.

DW: Well look, if you have an gastrointestinal issue, you can try something different; I mean what’s going to happen? You may gain nothing but there is no long-term damage. With cancer you may die. So, the responsibility with us in the complementary field is to be able to supply the information to oncologists so that they can encourage their patients to use some kind of supplement compound or similar which can help them terms of their chemotherapy. Chemo is so complex you can’t really make a generalization. I always insist that patients who come to me tell their oncologist what they are doing. And I will supply what I am doing to the oncologist, with some evidence as to why I am doing it, if they so desire.

JM: That sounds fantastic, actually, a really balanced approach. I agree that we need to be working with our mainstream colleagues and oncologists and providing evidence to back up our claims, so they don’t think that patients are just treating themselves from Google and inventing their own management plans.

JM: Can you give us a general indication of how many patients you have been able to help, overall, with reducing the side effects of chemotherapy using Traditional Chinese Medicine and nutritional medicine?

DW: Off the top of my head, I’d say about 80% of patients have benefited from the use of these kinds of botanical agents. As you know, it’s multifaceted, so there are issues like quality of life; people feel better. Again, it’s subjective because this patient may have been more tolerant of chemo, because everybody responds to varying degrees to chemotherapy. So, quality of life is one, reduction of side effects… in a number of cases where there is incipient kidney failure, we’ve actually been able to avoid the kidney failure by using herbs while they’re under chemotherapy. Again, subjective and anecdotal, but I believe that more of the patients can complete the same course of chemotherapy because they’ve been using some kind of botanical and get a superior outcome.

JM: That’s great, this will give people at least an about it. Thank you so much, Daniel, for your contribution, and I wish you good luck what all your future endeavors.

DW: Thank you