Product Description
(Fairview Press) Univ. of California, San Diego. Consumer text explains how patients can improve their odds for survival by demanding control over their health care, research conventional and alternative treatments, creating their own treatment strategy, and using the Internet to learn of new medical advances. Softcover.

CUSTOMER REVIEWS (Average Customer Rating: 5.0 based on 14 reviews)

A must have by B. Yves (Marseille, France)

5 Stars
April 15, 2008
I was diagnosed a brain tumor 5 years ago, it was removed 15 days later. I was astonished to find so much informations in this book I shoud have known from the very beginning that nobody knew or dare to share with me. I strongly recommend this book for someone dealing with this problem (family, patients). The message of the book can be summed up as "Grab your illness yourself and fight". It also give hope which is invaluable although many things influence the outcome (each case is different). Nonetheless I was convinced (as a scientist myself) with the pragmatic approach of the author.

An important book for scientists and lay people by John C. Neill

5 Stars
April 11, 2008
Dr. Ben Williams is an excellent writer who provides a rare opportunity for readers to learn about his "terminal" cancer through a scientist's eyes. In short, he has already survived and thrived over 15 years after he received a diagnosis of a disease that was supposed to lead to a rapid trip to the undertaker. In part one, he shares a very personal view of his own round-trip to Hades. His wry sense of humor makes it enjoyable, even though we share his painful experiences in the hands of some physicians who are not going to win awards for bed side manners. Patients and their loved ones can be torn apart by the healing art of medicine that was meant to cure them, but Dr. Williams kept his dignity and his wits about him, allowing his survival. In part two, Dr. Williams explains why the medical system needs reform. This is an excellent review of some of the basic flaws of scientific medicine. Physicians be warned, Dr. Williams is an iconoclast with a razer sharp mind and first rate scientific credentials, even after being kicked in the head with a near fatal brain tumor. Many physicians who have not had the benefit of an inductive scientific approach may be surprised to learn new ways of examining data. Third, Dr. Williams shares information that your oncologist won't tell you, including alternative medicine, supplements, cutting edge treatments and sources of information. Throughout the book the layman is provided with helpful guidance that will enable the patient and his/her caretakers to make their own choices. The book is also important because Ben was a very patient mentor to me when I was an undergraduate studying experimental psychology at the University of California, San Diego, some 33 years ago. I have the greatest respect for him as a leading scientist and a teacher; and now I have an even more profound respect for him as a tough fighter, and a leader who used his scientific prowess to save his own life, and who then wrote about it to help save others. My bias in favor of Ben aside, this important book will probably change the way cancer is dealt with politically, clinically and scientifically. It is an inspiration to all of us because it shows that what makes the human brain truly amazing is its ability to not only recover function, but to actually improve itself as a result of trauma. They say, "Physician, heal thyself". Dr. Williams not only talks the talk, he walks the walk. Bravo!

Extremely helpful for patients with Glioblastoma and their families by Artan Qerushi (Irvine, CA USA)

5 Stars
January 11, 2008
My sister was recently diagnosed with Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM) and I have been trying for more than three weeks to get information on the internet about available treatments. I found out about this book on the Wikipedia page on Glioblastoma. Reading this book has been extremely helpful for me to understand what my sister is dealing with and what I can do to maximize her chances of survival by finding information on the available treatments and their likelihood of sucess. Moreover the survival story of the author is truly inspiring and gives hope to patients and family members that the gloomy statistics of the medical establishment about this monstruous disease may be beaten.

12 Year Survivor of a 2 Year Disease by nh web programmer (NH USA)

5 Stars
November 05, 2007
The Gold Standard treatment for Glioblastoma Multiforme (GBM) brain tumors is a combination of surgery, radiation and the chemotherapy themozolomide (Temodar / Temodal). Untreated, GBM uniformly kills its victims within four months. For 10% of all patients treated with radiation, that survival expectation increases to two years. At four years, 3% of the original group will still be alive. Add Temodar and surgery to that radiation, and 27% of those treated can expect to survive to two years. At four years, 12% of those treated with the Gold Standard combination will still be alive. University study press releases cheer the dramatic increase in surivival rates for patients receiving Tamodar along with radiation and surgery. From 10% to 27% for two years and from 3% to 12% for four years are big jumps. While the numbers do represent a significant increase, the fact remains that at four years, 88% of those receiving the Gold Standard treatment for Glioblastoma Multiforme tumors will be dead. In 1995, before Temodar was anywhere near the marketplace, Dr. Ben Williams discovered that he had a large Glioblastoma Multiforme tumor. Williams looked at the survival rates for those receiving the recommended treatment and did not like the odds. A research scientist and academic, Williams scoured every resource to create a state-of-the-art Glioblastoma Multiforme protocol. He received all of the standard treatment, which he supplemented with six other anti-cancer, pro-immune agents (and aspirin for the side effects). Williams combined the prescribed treatment: * Surgery (which left mass behind) * Radiation * BCNU chemotherapy * PCV chemotherapy With these addition of these agents: * Tamoxifen * Verapamil * Accutane * Melatonin * Mushroom extract * Gamma Linolenic Acid * Aspirin The treatment the oncologist recommended was certain to result in Williams' death. Yet the doctor refused any treatment outside the standard protocol, for fear of doing harm. Williams believed that nothing was more harmful than death. The oncologist only budged a little. He gave Williams some Tamoxifen. Everything else Williams took to reduce his tumor - including a higher dose of Tamoxifen than the oncologist would prescribe -- he researched and obtained on his own. A 1995 Gold Standard for GBM tumor treatment did not exist. The oncologist offered surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. The difference between 1995 and 2007 is the accuracy of the radiation and the quality of the chemotherapy. At two years from diagnosis - when 92% of patients receiving standard treatment would be dead - Williams received the first of what is now 12 years of clean MRIs. Williams regards his low-toxicity drug cocktail as a synergistic weapon against glioblastoma multiforme. He compares the current Gold Standard GBM treatment to the AZT AIDS treatment. Although AZT worked at first, the body developed a resistance to it. No more HIV patients were alive at four years on AZT than off of it. GBM cancer cells also adapt to chemotherapy. They're not adept at adapting to the low-toxicity cocktail Williams invented. The Accutane prevented the cancer cells from consuming the cells nearby. The Tamoxifen slowed the cancer cells' ability to extrude out the chemotherapy. The Gamma-Linolenic Acid produced free radicals inside the tumor, killing it from the inside out. As a rule, oncologists do not offer these treatments to brain tumor patients. These treatments are not "proven." If the FDA (Food and Drug Administration) has not blessed the substance then the doctor will not prescribe it, even if the doctor's treatment itself means almost certain death. Doctors know, says Williams, that their patients will die. So what is the problem prescribing low-toxicity agents that might cure brain tumors? Going outside the system can have a dramatically negative affect on a doctor's career. He might be accused of fraud, profiteering or incompetence. In a profession based on the credo "First, do no harm," doctors would first like to do no harm to their own careers. Doctors find themselves trapped between the FDA and the medical self-policing infra-structure on the one hand, and certain death for their patients on the other. Doctors won't prescribe the cocktail agents Williams took because they are not "proven" according to FDA standards. The approval process requires billions of dollars. Pharmaceutical companies won't research drugs that will not be economically viable. The drug must be exclusive to the pharmaceutical company. The population requiring the drug must be large enough to expect a return on investment. Many of the agents Williams used to cure his cancer are not patentable. Competitors would be able to copy and sell the compound. About 12,000 people a year are diagnosed with glioblastoma multiforme tumors. The market is not large enough to justify very expensive scientific trials. Beaten down by disease, radiation and chemotherapy, few GBM patients have the energy to climb the hurdles to promising but not "proven" treatments. Even when the outcome is certain death patients who ask for more will not receive it. Just as AIDS patients created political pressure to get "unproven" treatments for HIV, Williams encourages GBM patients to insist on access to "unproven" treatments for GBM. Dispensing only "proven" treatment is legal, says Williams. But denying dying patients access to substances that could save their lives is grossly unethical. Already fighting the deadliest of brain tumors, patients should not have to fight for promising but "unproven" cures. Until the political pressure on the FDA reaches a critical mass, he says, the GBM Gold Standard Treatment will still produce a four year death rate of 88%. [...]

Not just for cancer victims! by Bertram Oliver Ploog

5 Stars
January 11, 2007
This book was written by Dr. Williams, an eminent and widely published experimental psychologist in the field of learning theory and many other related fields. Dr. Williams was diagnosed in 1995 with a glioblastoma with, for all practical purposes, zero chance of survival. He immediately went on a quest for maximizing his chances of survival by evaluating and combining traditional and nontraditional treatment approaches. Today, in 2007, he is alive and well. This book should be of interest for anyone, even if not affected by cancer personally. I found it a remarkable account of how one can deal with catastrophic diagnoses and seemingly hopeless situations. It also critiques current FDA policies and conventional medical practice by providing a wealth of facts, literature citations, and well-developed logical arguments. There is also a very readable discussion of the statistical approach, written for a lay audience, of experimental design, and of implications for the methods for the social and medical/biological sciences. This book includes a systematic, open, thoughtful, and fair evaluation of so-called alternative treatments. The evaluation of these alternative treatments is so convincing because it was undertaken by someone like Dr. Williams, who knows the scientific approach so well. I call this book "inspirational" for anyone who has to tackle important life-and-death decisions.

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