Cancer: Its Cause and Treatment, Volume 2 (of 2)

by Lucius Duncan Bulkley

In regard to the medicinal treatment of cancer it is difficult to be clear and definite, and yet concise within the limits allowed for a lecture. For, as you may imagine from what has been said in these and the previous course of lectures two years ago, there is no one remedy or even any single course of treatment which is to be invariably followed or is always successful in every case of cancer.

In a disease of such uncertainty as to its definite causation, and of such obstinacy and duration from its first inception, the remedies which may be required in different cases are as varied as are the peculiarities of the individual. The treatment requires the utmost diligence and solicitous care and attention to details on the part of both the physician and patient, and over a period of time which it may be difficult to secure. This is rather a different proposition from that of a relatively brief surgical operation, after which the patient is dismissed with the hope that the disease will not recur!

Patience and perseverance, with medical acumen, are the first requisites-but before this there must be a belief and confidence in the truth of the statements, the correctness of the theory, and the value of the method to be employed; with this there must also be an optimism on the part of the physician which begets a confidence in the patient, which will do much toward reaching the desired result. Unless much time, thought, study, and effort can be given to each case of cancer, I should deprecate any attempt to treat it medically, and rather risk at once the chances of surgery, poor as they are. It was for fear of harm following an incomplete understanding of, and an imperfect or careless carrying out of the line of practise which I had pursued satisfactorily for thirty years and more that I hesitated and delayed so long before urging it generally. But the steady rise in mortality under the ordinarily accepted treatment has impelled me to strive to make clear what I conceive to be the correct view of its nature and cause, and the approximately correct treatment of cancer.

From what has preceded in these and former lectures it will be seen at once that rational and right internal treatment must proceed and continue along the lines previously indicated relating to the biochemistry of cancer. Some tissue cells have taken on wrong and rampant action, of a reproductive character, owing to an erroneous metabolism, which has induced a deranged or disordered blood current, and some measures are to be devised and carried out to restore the bodily functions to a normal state.

The first line of medical treatment, therefore, after preventing the introduction of animal protein, coffee, and alcohol by dietary measures, is to seek to restore to normal the various bodily secretions and excretions. The urine, by repeated, complete, volumetrical analysis, serves as a constant guide along many lines, which I considered pretty fully in the former lectures and need not repeat now. In one private case of cancer of the breast the total amount of urine passed each day was measured and recorded daily, almost without an exception, for a whole year, and specimens of the same were carefully analyzed and studied almost every week. The total quantity of solids, which was at first only one half what the body weight called for, was brought up to about normal as the condition of the patient improved.

It is impossible in a single lecture to tell you of all the indications and teachings which may be learned from the urine, much of which must be acquired by close observation and experience. The urea is almost always diminished, and this indicates an imperfect anabolism of the body cells, as the urea represents the final metabolism of their nitrogen. Uratic deposits are not uncommon, but other evidences of faulty nitrogenous metabolism also occur, free uric acid, ammonia, aromatic oxyacids, etc., whose individual significance in relation to cancer it is hard to trace, but clinically these derangements seem to have to do with the virulence of the disease. Indican in excess, and often greatly increased sulphates, are common, evidencing disturbed intestinal action. All these and other abnormalities, having to do with a deranged blood current, are to be rectified by proper treatment, the minor details of which cannot be elaborated in a single lecture.

I have told you that imperfect intestinal excretion and constipation are almost invariably found in the subjects of cancer, even in very early stages and long before they have been induced by opiates given for pain. I may here remark casually that even in severe inoperable cases up to a fatal ending, I seldom have to give morphin when the patients are under a full and complete line of dietary and other proper treatment; these latter seem to so change the character of the blood stream, or act in some way so that there is not the pain previously suffered. Possibly it is in part through lowering the blood pressure.

The subject of intestinal stasis or constipation is, with urinary derangement, such a very large one that it cannot be fully compassed in a single lecture. So I shall take the liberty of speaking dogmatically and shall tell you more or less definitely what observation and experience has taught me to do along these lines of faulty urinary and intestinal action in cancer. And really you will find it similar in many respects to the lines of theory and practise which I try to develop for you in connection with certain diseases of the skin. For, after all, in many conditions of disease we are to treat the patient in regard to a disordered system, and not always so much the particular disease by name. You will also remember that I have told you how it was by observing certain breast tumors which had been diagnosed as cancer by competent surgeons, urging immediate removal, disappear without operation under such treatment as I was giving for other complaints, that led me to my present point of view and practise.

In regard, then, to the actual medical treatment employed I may say that in the Skin and Cancer Hospital, and also in private practise, these patients are almost always first given a certain mixture with which you are familiar, ℞ Potassæ acetatis ℥, Tinct. Nuc. Vom. ℥ss, Extract. Cascar. fl. ℨi-ℨv, Extract. Rumicis radicis fl. ad ℥iv, the amount of cascara being varied according to the action of the bowels, which should move freely twice daily. This commonly acts also somewhat on the urine. This mixture is always taken three times daily, half an hour before eating, in one third of a tumbler of water.

It is interesting to note that Forbes Ross, a London cancer surgeon, whose untimely death has deprived us of a valuable scientific worker along our present lines, was an ardent advocate of potassium in the treatment of cancer, whose value he established on biochemical as well as clinical grounds. He, however, pushed the administration of the salts of potassium far in excess of that which I have found necessary. He has related instances of advanced cancer in which the results were remarkable, and one of them, a case of cancer of the uterus in a widow aged 59, was quite a counterpart of one which I shall narrate to you next week. I wish I could give you in extenso some of the remarkable arguments from microscopic and chemico-physiological study which he gives, to explain how potassium has such a controlling effect on cancer cells; but it is quite out of the question in a lecture such as this to enter fully into every enticing field of inquiry, and I must refer you to his valuable work. I am quite aware that when published this book was the subject of some criticism and even ridicule, but reviewers could not have properly grasped the whole book, which was simply so far ahead of the times that it was not understood. Cancer was then, even more than now, in the grip of the surgeon, who resented any thought of treatment other than by the knife.