Doctor Accused of Flawed Research By TERRI LANGFORD Associated Press Writer
HOUSTON (AP) -- The research on a controversial cancer treatment is so flawed that it cannot be determined whether it really works, three prominent oncologists said. "It is scientific nonsense," Dr. Howard Ozer, director of the Allegheny Cancer Center in Philadelphia, said Wednesday. Ozer and two other physicians examined Dr. Stanislaw Burzynski's alternative cancer treatment known as antineoplastons for the Sept. 25 issue of The Cancer Letter, a widely read and well-respected Washington newsletter. Burzynski has claimed for years that antineoplastons, compounds found in human urine and blood, "turn off" cancer genes by interrupting signals that cause the cells to multiply. His treatment involves giving synthetically made antineoplastons to patients orally or intravenously. Many among Burzynski's fiercely devoted clientele say they would be dead without the therapy. But the other doctors who reviewed Burzynski's data say his research parameters are "poorly designed" and his data is "not interpretable." Those factors may preclude the public from ever knowing whether his treatment works, the researchers say. In a faxed, nine-page response, Burzynski said his detractors' findings can be attributed to their lack of complete information, their lack of expertise, or the cancer suffered by the patient. "The Cancer Letter, unfortunately, is not reporting the truth and only truth," the statement said. "It is also reporting the lies of the oncologists who were selected by The Cancer Letter to review the annual report (submitted to the U.S. Food and Drug Administration)." The three oncologists reviewed an annual report Burzynski submitted to the FDA in an effort to obtain federal approval of his treatment. The report included data Burzynski gathered from clinical trials of 963 patients who received antineoplastons over a 12-month period. Statistics released in April and culled by the FDA from Burzynski's preliminary reports show only 36, or 4.3 percent, of 828 patients treated intravenously with antineoplastons responded positively to the drug. Of the 36, 11 died. Burzynski's lawyer, Rick Jaffe, claimed the FDA's totals were wrong and he chided the agency for releasing preliminary data. The other two physicians who evaluated the data were Peter Eisenberg, a principal investigator with the Sutter Health West Cancer Research Group, and Henry Friedman, chairman of the brain tumor committee of the Pediatric Oncology Group. -- The silver-list is a moderated forum for discussion of colloidal silver. To join or quit silver-list or silver-digest send an e-mail message to: [email protected] -or- [email protected] with the word subscribe or unsubscribe in the subject: line. To post, address your message to: [email protected] List maintainer: Mike Devour <[email protected]>
