Stanislaw Rajmund Burzynski, Stanislaw R. Burzynski, Stanislaw Burzynski, Stan R. Burzynski, Stan Burzynski, S. R. BURZYNSKI, S. Burzynski, Arthur Burzynski, Hippocrates Hypocrite Hypocrites Critic Critics Critical HipoCritical
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My name is Doug Olson
I’m from Nebraska
Western Nebraska
And, uh, my mother has been diagnosed with pancreatic cancer
So, we, uh, middle of November, now this is first of, first of the year, eh, but in the middle of November her weight, she was losing weight, you know
She was suffering from indigestion and, and stomach pain, and so we started to have her checked, uh, for problems with her stomach for ulcers and that kind of thing, and all that proved negative, and they put her on an ulcer medicine anyway, thinking that maybe that would solve the inflammation in her stomach, and, uh, then we decided that we (?) better see another physician, and so we did that, and they then ultra sounded and then CAT scanned and found that she had tumors in her pancreas and in her liver
Uh, many years ago, back in, in the late 70’s, my parents had been involved with, with the cancer, uh, subject in regards to my father’s sister, and then his cousin
He started researching cancer and cancer treatments when his sister passed away, and then, uh, they got in contact with a doctor in Orden, Nebraska, that treated cancer patients with Laetrile, and he also did other, not so ordinary things
He did duculation therapy
Uh, a number of things that were really treatments for the disease rather than just treatments for the symptoms, and, uh, during that time, dad testified at the state legislature; they were trying to work against Dr. Miller’s license
This was the Dr. Miller in Orden, and, uh, so dad testified on, on his behalf
Uh, dad’s cousin was, uh, a patient of his, and she had a brain tumor the size of a lemon, and Dr. Miller put her on, uh, Laetrile treatments on a, on a special diet and some things, uh
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And this was what, in the 70’s ?
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This was back in the, probably the late 70’s, and, so, when they
Well they cured her
She had been sent home from the Mayo Clinic Given 3 to 6 months to live, and, uh, they had, uh, burned with radiation and cobalt I believe is what they were treating her with at that time
Uh, they burned the, uh, nerves in her eyes so that her eyes crossed
Uh, they sent her home to die
They, uh
She was in a wheelchair
She was a young woman and she had a young child
Wasn’t able to hold that child, and so when my dad saw her, met her, she was in that condition
She was it, in the last 6 months of her life
Gave her a book about, uh, the subject, and told her about Dr. Miller, and her family
She then went to Dr. Miller to see if there was any help for her, and he, and he immediately put her on Laetrile treatment then and, and, uh, the interesting thing about it, looking at his doctor’s protocol; because I’ve come across his protocol, uh, Dr. Miller was also giving his patients antineoplastons, and
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Yeah, because we’ve got this thing here that you gave me
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Mhmm
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Just explain to me what this is
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This was his physician’s protocol, to list, uh, the different medicines a person should, should be on
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If they had cancer
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Uh, if they had cancer, and so, uh, this was given to another friend of ours, a friend of the family, uh, the folks that rented one of our properties, uh, the woman got a, a tumor as well, and this was given to her as part of the regimen she should follow, and she was given Laetrile injections, and then as soon as the injections, uh, were over they went then to pills as the size of the dosage went down, and when you got to pills you got to go home
So, uh, I remember speaking to her at the time
I had a
I was in high school, and I had a summer job with her husband, who was the county engineer
So, uh, we saw them all the time, and she told us, uh, the circumstances when, when she was allowed to come home
She was feeling strong
She said: “I haven’t felt better”
As a part of the diet and the things that, that they had her doing
She said she felt better than she had in many years
So she and her daughter, started a business in town in order to pay for the treatments, and, uh, she recovered
The tumor continued to shrink and shrink until it was nothing
Uh, what had been listed as inoperable, uh, after it shrunk halfway they decided, well maybe we can operate on you
Uh, we think it’s operable now
She said: “Why would I let you operate when what I’m doing is working”?
But, uh, she is alive yet today and in her mid-80’s and, uh, so, uh, when it came to my mother’s illness, we contacted her, and asked her how she’s doing, and she’s sent this protocol she’s been keeping all these years
Uh, as a result of my parents knowing Dr. Miller back when he was alive
He is, he has passed away, uh, 7 maybe years ago, and, uh, many years ago when they were taking chelation therapy from him, he had given my mother, uh, a flyer on Dr. Burzynski, and, uh, said if anything ever happens to you after I’m gone, this is the man to contact, and so we’ve had that flyer in a file for many years at my parents house, and so when mom got sick she immediately began digging that out and found
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So your mom immediately started thinking, well I need to find that leaflet
That’s what we were told to do
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Yes
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And did, and did she go and speak to an oncologist?
Did she say that she wanted to come here, or ?
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We had a local physician, who was not an oncologist, that had, that was the 2nd physician we, we consulted, that did the ultrasound and the CAT scan for her and, and they knew that she had tumors, and no we did not go to an on, oncologist from there
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Why ?
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because we knew that we did not want to take their treatments, uh, so we immediately contacted the clinic here in, in Houston, Texas, and, uh, we had to wait on, uh, certain things to be completed
CAT scans
Different things had to be done, and, and information had to be sent down here and examined, and then, uh, after a period of maybe 2 weeks, hassling with information, we were told that, yes, uh, we, they would accept her as a patient, and we were getting in towards the holidays at that time
Would we like to wait until the holidays were over, because Christmas
You know, there would be 5 days off for Christmas, uh, over a weekend and 5 days off for New Years over a weekend, and we would be down here in Houston over those times, but we elected to come anyway because we could get the treatment started right away
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Mhmm
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rather than to wait another month before starting treatments, and, uh, so they, uh, immediately put, put her on antineoplastons and, uh, they sent away the tissue samples to Arizona to have a CARIS test done, and determine what medications would be
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So did you have those results come back ?
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Yes, those results came back quicker than what we expected
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And wh, what did they show ?
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Well they, they show a, a list of treatments that are effective, and against it, and then a list of treatments actually that encourage it’s growth
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Yeah
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So you end up with a list of, uh, approximately 7 on each side
7 good
7 bad
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And these are all different cancer drugs
So what they’re looking at is all
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Yes
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is all the different cancer drugs, and which ones
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And whether we’ve got a, a thousand or 2 thousand different drugs that person might try, and, uh, so
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So the (?) for how to, to try a few of these chemotherapies, but in very small doses
Is that right ?
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There’s 2, 2 chemotherapies
One is an, is an oral chemotherapy that is, uh, quite mild in its side effects, and then, uh, there’s another much stronger one that was, uh, also one of th, the top 2, and, uh, the side effects for it are more varied and more violent, uh, if you will, and, uh, my mother’s had one treatment of that so far, and the treat, the side effects
She did, is suffering from side effects from that particular
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Yeah
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It’s Oxaliplatin, and, uh, some people have very violent side effects but she’s thankfully not had any violent side effects
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So why didn’t you go down the conventional road of having high-dosechemotherapy?
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Well, when you research the, uh, success rate, with pancreatic cancer, going the normal way, uh, or the normal, uh, road, the success rate is very, very small, and so you’re just guaranteeing, in my opinion, if, if the success rate is 5% or under, uh, you’re introducing yourself to a, a road to death, that’s very unpleasant
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Yeah
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You know, you just want to go home and make yourself very comfortable on painkillers and, and enjoy the rest of your life, uh, if that’s the, if that’s the road you’re planning to take
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Yeah
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Uh, that was our opinion, and so
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What do you think about all the resistance then of, of Dr. Burzynski and all of the kind of, uh, ?
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We have
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(?) people just calling him a
What’s the word ?
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Charlatan
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Charlatan
Yeah
Fraud
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Yes, we, uh, we have seen course, of course these things through our, our life
Dr. Miller
The whole Laetrile treatment thing was something that was, uh, thrown out
You know, it’s pretty well suppressed now
You can go to Mexico and get those treatments
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Why do you think they were, pushed aside ?
This Laetrile
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It’s
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What is Laetrile?
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Well Laetrile is a naturally occurring, uh, substance that you find in some of our foods
It’s, they call it B17 although, vitamin B17, although there’s some discussion as to whether it’s really a vitamin
Another name for it is Amygdalin
—————————————————————— Amygdalin
Yeah
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Uh, it’s found in peach pits and apricot pits in high levels but there’s a number of other foods that you find it in
Uh, it, it,
I’m not sure, whether this is 100% accurate, but my understanding of it is it’s associated with, with cyanide, and it would be, uh, like an encapsulated cyanide, that as it travels through your body, the cyanide portion, um, does not become available to your body until it becomes in, uh, associated with a cancer cell
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Yeah
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and the cancer cells attack the outer shell of that molecule, and the cyanide becomes, uh, uh, available then, and it kills the cancer cell that’s right there
So it was apparently a very nontoxic substance
Uh, you have regulated dosages
I mean, it seems to me interesting, uh, when a doctor prescribes a dose of chemotherapy, uh, there’s nothing that I can think of much more toxic than a, than a chemotherapy drug, and certainly they’ll kill you if they don’t, uh, give you the right dosage, but it was not seemed, deemed accessible that a byproduct of food; which a doctor could regulate the dosage of as well, could be used as a transfer, cancer treatment
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Yeah
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Uh, and we’ve seen things in the past, as well
When I was a, a very young child, I had a great aunt, that, uh, I was not even aware; at the time I was very young, she was traveling to Texas and getting treatments
Uh, one of them was called the Hoxsey treatment and, uh, she was living a very comfortable life on treatments that she got there
There were 2 treatments in Texas at that time, that, uh, were available
The FDA would come in and raid the clinics, and make just life miserable for them
They got one of them closed down, and that was the one that my great aunt was on, and that treatment was, was pills that she could take, uh, and live quite comfortably, in Nebraska
Once they closed that clinic down, then she had to go down, uh, to the other clinic in Texas, which was a supplement that was a liquid that tasted bad, and she had to make frequent trips, at that point, but still, as long as she could get that treatment she was comfortable and, and lived a normal life
A productive life
Uh, we knew her as our great aunt and, and didn’t even know her, uh, uh, that there was a health problem and, uh, but then the FDA got that clinic closed down
So, as soon as she lost access to those, her treatments, then her cancer which, uh, was no longer able to be controlled, came back strong and, and she died
So, uh, the family had been, had access to this knowledge and this, the FDA’s games with cancer treatments for many years
Um, I’m also married to, a, a gal whose father did blood research as a, he was a Ph.D and worked in university hospitals, in blood research all of his life
He, he discovered a blood protein that was associated with cancer
Uh, it was actually associated more with good health, maybe than you could say with cancer, but he discovered a, a blood coagulation protein, uh, or associated with blood coagulation that would, that could be used as a flag or a test, to see whether a person was healthy or not
Uh, as they applied it to patients in these hospitals, during their research trials, they found that this protein was an indicator whether a person had cancer or thrombosis
Uh, 2 of the very largest killers, and this protein, if present in high enough amounts in our blood, uh, was an indicator that you were healthy, and as the protein’s amount, uh, declined, then it was an indicator that something was wrong, and below a certain amount you knew something was wrong
You better be taking further testing
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Mhmm
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to find out what your problem was
Uh, that has run into resistance
Uh, that (?) has not been approved by the FDA, and, uh, th, our family’s experiences with cancer treatments, cancer drugs, as they’re affected by the FDA, we have determined by our opinion that, uh, it’s, un, unless there’s something that’s going to generate a, a lot of capital, and then a lot of tax money for the Federal Government, the FDA’s not very interested in it
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Yeah
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Uh, so, cynical attitude, but evidence bears it out
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Yeah
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and so we remain cynical until so, until something proves
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Yeah, absolutely
So this is this doctor in, uh, in the 70’s
This is information that he provided
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Yes
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and you can see here that he is obviously, antineoplastic enzymes
See, here obviously
Do you think he meant Dr. Burzynski?
He just knew of him ?
You have no idea ?
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I have no idea
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He was obviously a fan, if he was someone that eventually said
He said it to you
Did you say he said it to your mum or to your dad?
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To my mom
Probably to mom and dad
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Yeah
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Uh, my mom was the record keeper, and so, she kept the flyer
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Yeah
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but they both took, uh, the, uh, the therapy from, uh, well, the blood therapy
I mentioned it earlier
Suddenly the name’s gone away
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Yeah
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but, uh
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That’s ok
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So
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So what about, um
You know, one of the barriers that we had is, when we spoke to oncologists, they just said, no, you mustn’t come to see this guy
His work isn’t peer-reviewed
He’s a charlatan
Why, why do you think they would say that ?
What
I mean I’m surprised, that these oncologists don’t actually come here, to actually see what, what’s going on
So your opinion about that ?
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My opinion is, that physicians are, very much, tied up, with large pharmaceutical corporations
Uh, I spoke with my father-in-law
My father-in-law had to have research done in, in his Ph.D work, and he had to get cooperation from hospitals, from doctors, and, uh, all of these organizations in order to have the research done that he needed done, ’cause past his lab, when he wants to introduce research, onto a patients, uh, live blood, and he needs to collect specimens from patients, then a whole ‘nother group of, uh, set of authorizations have to be signed and, and he being a Ph.D working with the medical profession all his life, he knew how tied up the medical profession is, by, generally by M.D.’s, that control the money flow, uh, in the medical profession
Ph.D’s do the research, but they have to apply for grants, and typically the grants are controlled by M.D.’s, and so if an M.D. Decides that your, your particular research is either applicable to, uh, something they think will make a lot of money, or it’s the, the quote, uh, popular, popular item of the day
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Yeah
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Politically correct, you name it, then you’re going to get funded
Otherwise, uh, my father-in-law noticed at different times, his research had to be funded out of his own pocket, and at other times, it looked like, it was something that doctors would like, and so they would, he would get funding, but I think that, ah, as he commented, any doctor, coming out of med school, has been contacted by a pharmaceutical company, and has probably signed a contract, that when that pharmaceutical company wants to test a drug, or test an item, that that medical, uh, doctor, will be accessible to them, to test their products
So, with the number of pharmaceutical companies that you have, and all of them recruiting M.D.’s as they come out of med school, and saying, you know, would you be part of our group, you end up under contract with the large pharmaceutical companies
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Mhmm
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and if, if 90% of the doctors are under contract with pharmaceutical companies, to, uh, to cooperate with their drug testing, then large Pharma, has control of virtually all doctors, and so, uh, uh, if you have large Pharma saying, we don’t want to see a cancer cure, that we’re not in control of, we don’t want to see something that makes curing disease cheap, and easy, and food related, then you’re not gonna
They’re going to put the word out to all their doctors: Don’t have any wo, don’t have anything to do with this
Uh, they can come up with, some written material for their, their doctors to read
They send them the evidence
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Mmm
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It may be accurate
It may not be very accurate, and, uh, but it’s just a smear campaign to destroy reputations so that they don’t get hurt financially
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Mhmm
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and, uh, so, uh, that’s the reason I believe
You know, most of these doctors, they don’t have the time, or the expertise to do the research themselves
They can’t read everything, and so when someone they trust, or someone that they’re financially, uh, obligated to, comes down and says: Here’s the stand that we want you to take, and it’s against this particular treatment, or against this doctor, they do what they’re told
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Yeah
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They do what they know best
Uh, my father-in-law, for instance, was, uh, also involved as a professor in these med centers
He taught nutrition, and he said it’s always a, been amazing to me that you can get through med school, and never take a class on, on nutrition
So you can become an M.D., and not understand the value, of nutrition, to a person’s health
That’s a problem
Uh, he recognized it as a problem
I recognize it as a problem because I particularly believe that most of our ill health is because how we treat our bodies
What we eat
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Mhmm
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Whether we exercise or don’t
Whether we provide our body with a way to flush the poisons or not
Uh, healthy living, and if you don’t teach our medical profession, healthy living, how can they teach their patients
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Mhmm
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So this, this whole system is, is just flawed in some ways, and weak in other ways, and, uh, controlled, for the purposes of commerce, instead of the public
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Yeah
So you, you think it’s a good idea treating people as an individual and finding out what they need as opposed to like carpet bombing them ?
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Absolutely
When we understood the, the individualized approach, here at the Burzynski Clinic, that they would take where they would test the cancer cells, uh, against all of these treatments and all of these chemotherapy treatments and, and anything else that might be out there that would, would treat cancer, and come back with a, a individualized care approach to the individualized cells of cancer that my mother has, that’s when we knew that we had to come here
We wondered, and I’ve told my friends, and everybody wonders, that oughta be the standard approach everywhere
Why wouldn’t you test, every cancer, and see what it is that’s gonna treat it best ?
You, you tell me
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Doug Olson chats with Pete Cohen
January 2011
25:00
11/9/2012
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For years, Gorski has been able to comment on Burzynski’s “personalized gene targeted therapy” with impunity
It’s about time he received some personal attention, leading to heapin’ helpings of not-so-Respectful Insolence
All of the below articles by Gorski were tagged as having to do with:
personalized gene targeted cancer therapy, or mention it
—————————————————————— http://scienceblogs.com/insolence/tag/personalized-gene-targeted-cancer-therapy/
—————————————————————— I AM ADDING TO THIS AS I GO ALONG
====================================== [1] – 6/5/2013 – ” … in January the Burzynski Clinic removed all references to antineoplaston therapy on its website … “
—————————————————————— [2] – 8/4/2013 – I proved Gorski wrong since Burzynski’s scientific publications regarding antineoplaston therapy are on the Burzynski website
====================================== [1] – 6/5/2013 – “Three years should be plenty of time to line up clinical sites for a phase III trial”
“Of course, given that after three years the clinical trial hasn’t been opened, more than likely no reputable institution wants to partner with the Burzynski Research Institute, and ResearchPoint collected its checks”
—————————————————————— [3] – 7/18/2013 – This statement by Gorski is disingenuous since 6/3/2013 he reviewed Burzynski: Cancer Is Serious Business, Part II where this issue was addressed, and he made NO COMMENT about it in his review
Gorski can distort, exaggerate, and even lie to the public
====================================== [1] – 6/5/2013 – “Another interesting tidbit in the SEC filing is Burzynski’s report of the results of several of his clinical trials”
“They aren’t really “results’ per se, in that the information presented really isn’t provided in a form that really allows other investigators to evaluate it and potentially replicate it”
“Basically it’s a big table listing Burzynski Research Institute clinical trials”
“Of course, I realize that this is an SEC filing, not a scientific paper in the peer-reviewed literature, but if Burzynski has all this data to produce this table it boggles the mind that, given at least a decade and a half since these trials began, he hasn’t been able to publish any meaningful data thus far”
“That he hasn’t been able to do so is also a big red flag”
—————————————————————— [5] – 8/21/2013 – That Gorski has NOT been able to prove that the 4 Burzynski publications I refer to are NOT “meaningful data” is a big red flag
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – “It’s a theme that is repeated throughout the report but that ignores the astounding level of sheer deception that goes on at the Burzynski Clinic, the allegations of overfilling, and how Burzynski has abused the clinical trial process to keep treating patients with antineoplastons without actually having to do the science that any other doctor would be required to do to validate a new treatment”
—————————————————————— [7] – 6/23/2013 – This is the 1st time I’ve seen Gorski allege “overfilling,” and I sure have NOT seen him provide any proof of that or that Burzynski is NOT doing “the science that any other doctor would be required to do to validate a new treatment”
If anyone is being “deceptive,” it seems to be Gorski
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – Dr. Elloise Garside, a research scientists, echoes a lot of the questions I have, such as how Burzynski never explains which genes are targeted by antineoplastons, … “
—————————————————————— [8] – 8/7/2013 – Gorski has NO response for where I list where Burzynski “explains which genes are targeted by antineoplastons”
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – ” … what the preclinical evidence supporting their efficacy are … “
—————————————————————— [9] – 3/16/2013 – Gorski does NOT mention where he’s reviewed “the preclinical evidence supporting their efficacy”
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – ” … or what the scientific rationale is to expect that they might have antitumor activity”
—————————————————————— [10] – 8/8/2013 – Gorski reviewed “Burzynski: Cancer Is Serious Business” (Part I), but acts as if Dvorit D. Samid was NOT mentioned, and that he is NOT aware that the BurzynskiMovie website contains supporting documentation
I can’t let such statements go unchallenged
It means NadaZeroZip
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – “In science, all that matters is what you publish, and Burzynski hasn’t published anything other than case reports, tiny case series, and unconvincing studies, mostly (at least over the last decade or so) in crappy journals not even indexed on PubMed”
—————————————————————— [5] – 8/21/2013 – I remain unimpressed that Gorski has NOT written a review of Burzynski’s 2003-2010 phase II clinical trial preliminary reports
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – “Without a doubt, the most effective part of the story is the segment in which Dr. Jeanine Graf of the Texas Children’s Hospital is introduced”
“Dr. Graf is the director of the pediatric intensive care unit there and has taken care of lots of Burzynski patients, as her hospital is “just down the road” from the Burzynski Clinic and these unfortunate children are brought to her hospital when they decompensate”
“Indeed, coupled with this segment is an interlude where Luna Petagine’s mother complains that the staff there know and recognize Burzynski patients (and, she notes, hate the Burzynski Clinic)”
“Particularly damning is how Ms. Petagine said that the Texas Children’s Hospital Staff “were always cleaning up Burzynski’s messes.””
“Luna was brought to the Texas Children’s Hospital during her time in Houston, and the staff there recognized right away that she was a Burzynski patient because they had seen so many similar patients suffering the same complications before”
“It was also clear how much contempt the staff there had for the Burzynski Clinic”
“If there’s one thing Panorama did right in this report, it’s showing how seeing so many already dying children show up in our ICU because of hypernatremia due to antineoplaston therapy will do that”
“Perhaps the most devastating part of this segment was seeing Dr. Graf stating, point blank, that she’s never seen a Burzynski patient survive”
“True, she does point out that patients don’t come to her until they are in extremis, but the fact remains that she’s never seen any of them live”
—————————————————————— [11] – 4/24/2013 – What is so ridiculous about this is that Richard Bilton wanted numbers from Burzynski, but then when it came to this part of the documentary, he somehow forgets how to ask how many patients this applies to, and Gorski compounds this by trying to blame hypernatremia on antineoplaston therapy, but he refuses to explain how it is that in this Division of Internal Medicine / Department of General Internal Medicine, University of Texas, MD Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, TX, USA, cancer study, over a 3 month period in 2006 re 3,446 patients, most of the HYPERNATREMIA (90 %) was acquired during hospital stay, and these patients were NOT on antineoplaston therapy
Arrogance, dismissiveness, and condescension make him his own worst enemy
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – “Burzynski also pulls out the old trope that, if the FDA has been letting him use antineoplastons for 20 years in clinical trials if they weren’t safe and potentially effective, that the FDA wouldn’t let him “sell hope without evidence.””
“(Those of us following Burzynski for a while know, unfortunately, that that isn’t necessarily true.)”
—————————————————————— [12] – 4/25/2013 – “The FDA’s Drug Review Process: Ensuring Drugs Are Safe and Effective” advises:
“[T]he emphasis in Phase 2 is on EFFECTIVENESS”
“Phase 3 studies begin if EVIDENCE of EFFECTIVENESS is shown in Phase 2″
The FDA has approved Burzynski’s phase 3 clinical trials, which means that antineoplastons have shown evidence of effectiveness, whether Gorski likes it or NOT
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – ” … he goes on to repeat the same refrain he’s been repeating for the last decade or so about how he’s on the verge of publishing all the results that will convince everyone”
“One notes that we’re still waiting”
—————————————————————— [13] – 7/25/2013 – Gorski provides NO citation to support his statement, and, he did a review of “Burzynski: Cancer Is Serious Business, Part II,” but conveniently does NOT comment in his review about the refusal e-mail shown in the film, and its suspect content
====================================== [6] – 6/4/2013 – “Burzynski needs to publish, but I highly doubt that he will, at least not in a form that is informative to real oncologists”
—————————————————————— [5] – 8/21/2013 – I’m waiting for Gorski to prove that the 4 Burzynski publications I refer to are “NOT in a form that is informative to real oncologists”
Why don’t YOU cite a phase 2 clinical trial final publication that has substantially more data fields than the 4 publications I mention ?
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “I refer you to the link for my discussion of many of the problems with the movie”
“Here I will concentrate mainly on issues that I haven’t discussed before, because actually seeing Burzynski II was a revelation”
“(Yes, I put that sentence there on purpose, Eric Merola; quote mine it if you have the cojones)”
—————————————————————— [3] – 7/18/2013 – Gorski, don’t wait for Eric Merola to quote you
I’ve quoted you
Now let’s see if YOU have the cajones
MY review of your “review” should be a revelation to YOU
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “I’m referring to Chris Onuekwusi, a man who was diagnosed with stage I colon cancer”
“Instead of undergoing straightforward surgery that we know to have a high probability of success (which, I’ll also point out, can be done these days through minimally invasive laparoscopic techniques), Onuekwusi balked, as described in more detail than in the movie in this article on the Burzynski Patient Group website”
“He had even gone for a second opinion at one of the leading cancer centers in the world, the University of Texas M.D. Anderson Cancer Center, where the surgeon told him the same thing”
“He needed surgery first”
—————————————————————— [3] – 7/18/2013 – Mr. Onuekwusi did NOT want surgery
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “So what did Burzynski recommend instead of surgery?”
“He recommended a cocktail of three drugs given off-label:”
“Zolinza, Xeloda, and Avastin”
“Zolinza is vorinostat, a histone deacetylase inhibitor; Xeloda is capecitabine, which is a prodrug for 5-fluorouracil (5-FU), a pyrimidine analog that inhibits the enzyme thymidylate synthetase and thereby inhibits DNA synthesis to toxic effect in rapidly dividing cells; and Avastin is bevacizumab, a humanized monoclonal antibody directed against vascular endothelial growth factor-A (VEGF-A)”
“As I described in a previous post about Burzynski’s “personalized, gene-targeted cancer therapy,” apparently Burzynski sent Onuekwusi’s tumor to Caris for testing”
====================================== [14] – 3/2010 – Burzynski advised that a blood or pathology specimen can be used for testing, and that results from a blood test can be obtained within 2 days, and used and refined by a pathology specimen within 2 to 3 weeks
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “Caris generated a report, as it always does, and Burzynski came up with a witches’ brew of new expensive targeted agents, all said to be “off-label.””
====================================== [15] – 5/17/2011 – Well, not exactly
Burzynski made it clear in part 2 of this interview that there is constant searches of medical literature (phase 2 and phase 3 publications) to research the medications to be used based on the cancer genes involved, and that they have worked on software so oncologists can use it to choose the best medications instead of reinventing the wheel and having to review the medical literature again
So, he does NOT come up with a “witches’ brew”
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “One of these drugs is just an old chemotherapy drug in a new form”
“Xeloda is, in essence, 5-FU, a chemotherapeutic drug that has been used to treat colorectal cancer, both as adjuvant chemotherapy and first-line therapy for metastatic disease, for over 40 years”
“There’s nothing really “targeted” about the drug except that it inhibits an enzyme, the way that many drugs do and have been known to do for decades”
“The advantage of Xeloda is that it can be administered orally, which is a good thing”
====================================== [16] – What Gorski fails to mention is that Xeloda (Capecitabine) is approved to be used alone or with other drugs to treat:
Stage III colon cancer in patients who have had surgery to remove cancer
May also apply to unapproved uses being studied
—————————————————————— [17] – fluoropyrimidine carbamate belonging to class of antineoplastic agents called antimetabolites
As prodrug, capecitabine is selectively activated by tumor cells to cytotoxic moiety, 5-fluorouracil (5-FU); subsequently, 5-FU is metabolized to 2 active metabolites, 5-fluoro-2-deoxyuridine monophosphate (FdUMP) and 5-fluorouridine triphosphate (FUTP) by tumor cells and normal cells
FdUMP inhibits DNA synthesis and cell division by reducing normal thymidine production, while FUTP inhibits RNA and protein synthesis by competing with uridine triphosphate for incorporation into RNA strand
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “Similarly, Avastin, although relatively new, is also commonly used for colorectal cancer, albeit usually for metastatic disease and not as adjuvant chemotherapy”
====================================== [18] – What Gorski fails to mention is that Avastin (Bevacizumab) is approved to be used alone or with other drugs to treat:
Colorectal cancer that has metastasized (spread to other parts of body)
May also apply to unapproved uses being studied
—————————————————————— [19] – A recombinant humanized monoclonal antibody directed against the vascular endothelial growth factor (VEGF), a pro-angiogenic cytokine
Bevacizumab binds to VEGF and inhibits VEGF receptor binding, thereby preventing the growth and maintenance of tumor blood vessels
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “That leaves Zolinza, which is an HDAC inhibitor used to treat cutaneous T cell lymphoma”
====================================== [20] – What Gorski fails to mention is that Zolinza (Vorinostat) is a histone deacetylase inhibitor, approved for treatment of cutaneous manifestations of cutaneous T-cell lymphoma (CTCL) in patients with progressive, persistent, or recurrent disease
May also apply to unapproved uses being studied
—————————————————————— [21] – A synthetic hydroxamic acid derivative with antineoplastic activity
Vorinostat, a 2nd generation polar-planar compound, binds to catalytic domain of histone deacetylases (HDACs)
Allows hydroxamic moiety to chelate zinc ion located in catalytic pockets of HDAC, thereby inhibiting deacetylation and leading to accumulation of both hyperacetylated histones and transcription factors
Hyperacetylation of histone proteins results in upregulation of cyclin-dependant kinase p21, followed by G1 arrest
Hyperacetylation of non-histone proteins such as tumor suppressor p53, alpha tubulin, and heat-shock protein 90 produces additional anti-proliferative effects
Agent induces apoptosis and sensitizes tumor cells to cell death processes
Vorinostat crosses blood-brain barrier
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “One wonders if Burzynski included a second HDAC inhibitor, his second favorite drug after antineoplastons, sodium phenylbutyrate”
====================================== [22] – 11/19/2012 – Gorski, if you had done “exhaustive research” on Burzynski and “Gene-Targeted Cancer Therapy,” you would have viewed this @youtube video:
Texas Med. Bd. v. Dr. Burzynski – Gene-Targeted Cancer Therapy – Case Dismissed 11/19/2012
BurzynskiMovie
and you would have heard Mr. Onuekwusi say at 3:45, that he took phenylbutyrate (PB)
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “So, by Merola’s own description, what Burzynski did was to administer a toxic form of treatment that was probably not needed (chemotherapy) using drugs that were not approved for that indication, and apparently didn’t insist that the patient needed surgery”
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – Gorski publishes so much garbage that he may have forgotten his article where he posted:
“Then, there is also this video, produced by the Burzynski clinic itself:”
“At around the three minute mark, the announcer states:”
“We combine gene-targeting drugs and low dose chemo, if needed”
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “Now, it’s possible that the combination of drugs did eliminate the tumor”
====================================== Gorski, do you think that’s because as mentioned in [15], above, Burzynski would review publications like this ?
[24] – 8/23/2011 – A randomized, phase III trial of capecitabine [Xeloda] plus bevacizumab [Avastin] (Cape-Bev) versus capecitabine plus irinotecan plus bevacizumab (CAPIRI-Bev) in first-line treatment of metastatic colorectal cancer: the AIO KRK 0110 trial/ML22011 trial [1st-line treatment of patients with unresectable metastatic colorectal cancer (mCRC)]
—————————————————————— [25] – 11/2/2010 – Vorinostat [Zolinza] synergises with capecitabine [Xeloda] through upregulation of thymidine phosphorylase
—————————————————————— [26] – 4/2012 – Phase I–II study of vorinostat [Zolinza] plus paclitaxel and bevacizumab [Avastin] in metastatic breast cancer: evidence for vorinostat-induced tubulin acetylation and Hsp90 inhibition in vivo
—————————————————————— [4] – 6/3/2013 – “In my opinion, Burzynski deserves to have his medical license taken away on the basis of how he treated Chris Onuekwusi alone, not even considering all the other dubious things he’s done”
====================================== [27] – 8/27/2013 – In my opinion, Gorski deserves to have his medical license taken away on the basis of how he has misinformed, disinformed, and lied about Burzynski, not even considering all the other dubious things he’s done
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “All I can say is that Merola and Burzynski must not have searched very hard, because I quickly found a few … “
“Truly, Merola’s “exhaustive” research skills need some upgrading”
“It took me two minutes to find those articles”
====================================== [22] – 11/19/2012 – All I can say is that Gorski must NOT have searched very hard, because I quickly found this @youtube video about Dr. Burzynski – Gene-Targeted Cancer Therapy, which includes a segment on Burzynski’s cancer gene testing at 2:45
Truly, Gorski’s “exhaustive” research skills need some upgrading, since nowhere does it indicate that Burzynski was involved with doing Merola’s research
It took me 2 minutes to find this out
Seeing is believing?
To me seeing is knowing just how intellectually dishonest David Gorski is
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – Seeing The Skeptics
“Particularly seemingly damning are a series of Tweets flashed on the screen saying things like the Hope for Laura fund (the fund set up by Laura Hymas to pay for her treatment at the Burzynski Clinic) “appears to be just a money laundry for a lying quack fraud” and “when Laura dies #Burzynski will just move on to his next mark if she doesn’t run out of money first.””
“I think I know whose Tweets these were”
“In fact, I’m sure I know whose Tweets these were, and all I can say to that person is this:”
“Zip it”
“Stop it”
“Put a sock in it”
“In fact, if I’m correct about whose Tweets these are I think I have already done so on Twitter when I’ve seen this person getting too close to attacking cancer patients”
“Still, as utterly insensitive and “dickish” as those Tweets were, they do not represent the majority of skeptics, but rather a few jerks”
“However, we as skeptics need to remember that a few jerks perceived (or painted) as attacking cancer patients can do immeasurable damage to the cause of science-based medicine”
“So if you’re one of those skeptics making comments like that, knock it off”
“If I see you doing it again, next time I will call you out publicly”
====================================== [28] – 2/19/2013 – Like this ?
——————————————————————
Of course it's always possible that the money launderers are appearing as themselves in the #Burzynski advertisement.
——————————————————————
And this ?
——————————————————————
BurzynskiSaves (@BurzynskiSaves) tweeted at 7:42pm – 25 Dec 11:
“@RatbagsDotCom:They will be even more vulnerable when Laura dies and #Burzynski forgets her and moves on to the next mark” #unconscionable https://twitter.com/BurzynskiSaves/status/151115741888909312
—————————————————————— [29] – 8/1/2013 – And like you called this guy out ?
——————————————————————
David James (@StortSkeptic) tweeted at 7:08pm – 1 Aug 13:
The new Doctor Who will be Stanislaw #Burzynski. He manages to continually avoid getting cornered and he gets away with murder.
The new Doctor Who will be Stanislaw #Burzynski. He manages to continually avoid getting cornered and he gets away with murder.
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – “Then, there was the kicker”
“Eric Merola and Laura Hymas’ fiancé Ben Hymas called me a liar”
“Ben Hymas is quite mistaken in saying about me,”
““He’s lying to them.””
“Moreover, if I had screwed up, I would have admitted it”
“Indeed, part of the reason I looked into this so closely was because I wondered if somehow Merola had actually found a mistake I had made”
“You know the saying about the proverbial blind squirrel occasionally managing to find a nut?”
“It’s possible, albeit unlikely, and in fact there was no mistake”
“There is nothing in deceptive to change my assessment of what happened in the case of or my opinion of Eric Merola”
====================================== [3] – 7/18/2013 – As I said before, Gorski’s research skills leave much to be desired
Gorski is a hack and is only funny by accident because he has no filters
If anything, having seen his “review” of Burzynski II, my opinion of Gorski has plummeted even further, something I had thought possible
Gorski, so you got lucky like a blind squirrel and found an error
However, this does NOT change the fact that you’ve been proven to be a liar
Do you want me to subtract one of your lies from the tally ?
====================================== [30] – 5/9/2013 – “On what basis is he “targeting” his therapy?”
“As I’ve recounted before, Burzynski usually sends off blood and tissue samples to Caris for testing”
“The Caris Target Now™ test, which since my discussion of Burzynski’s “personalized therapy” appears to have been renamed Caris Molecular Intelligence and is now available at more levels of service (although its reports look much the same to me), is nothing unique to the Burzynski Clinic”
“Anyone who is willing to pay for it can have it, and the report will be the same”
“In any event, there is as yet no convincing evidence that the Caris tests (or any of the other competing tests) result in better outcomes”
====================================== [31] – 5/28/2013 – A key pillar of Gorski’s position on Burzynski’s “personalized gene-targeted cancer therapy” is that he alleges that he is “someone relatively knowledgeable about the state of personalized cancer therapy”
I can’t help but wonder why it is that he did NOT know the above information
Maybe he isn’t as knowledgeable about personalized cancer therapy and targeted therapies as he claims
(Oh, wait. He isn’t!)
That’s why when he wrote his “review” on Sheila Herron, he did NOT even refer to Burzynski’s publication:
—————————————————————— [32] – 8/2011 – Successful Treatment of Recurrent Triple-Negative Breast Cancer with Combination of Targeted Therapies
When it comes to Gorski’s “story writing” pal Robert J. “Bob” Blaskiewicz, I might allow for some leeway since he’s only a “Perfessor,” but with Gorski on the other hand, I’m not nearly so benevolent
In my ever-Insolent opinion, he and his propagandist are cynically using patients like human shields to deflect criticism
Activities I cannot countenance
====================================== [33] – 4/19/2013 – “I now think I probably know with around 95% certainty) and Didymus Judas Thomas (whose identity I’m probably about 75% sure of … also obsessively read anything posted about Eric Merola or Stanislaw Burzynski on any social media”
====================================== [34] – 4/19/2013 – Gorski has had over 4 months to say who he thinks I supposedly am, and so far he’s been a failure
But then again, as could be expected, he was wrong about his 2nd theory as well
Finally, I believe that people like Gorski are hypocrites, feeling free to paint Burzynski to their heart’s content (from what I’ve read about Burzynski on blogs, Twitterarticles, and elsewhere, posted by biased, disingenuous, “holier than thou” Skeptics, in them Burzynski is all but portrayed as Satan Incarnate) but running like whipped puppies to the Coward section when either they or Gorski are criticized, no matter how civil, reasonable, or science-based that criticism is (and my blog is all of the above)
The reason is, of course, clear
Having no convincing science, no convincing medicine, and no convincing evidence to support their hero’s antineoplastons hackery or “personalized MUD-targeted therapy for dummies,” they resort to Twitter thuggery
Same as it ever was
One more thing:
If Gorski and his crew of sycophants, toadies, and lackeys are offended by my opinion, my characterization of them that I have based on analyses of claims and observation of the behavior of them and their propagandist, they should try something different to shut me up
I have just the thing, too
Publishing the results of some of the responses to my blog for the scientific community comes to mind first
If Gorski really has the goods, as he and “The Skeptics” claim, then he can best shut me up by bringing the science—solid, convincing science, that is
I’ve said it before many times, and I’ll say it again:
I can be convinced by strong truthful and factual evidence
I have yet to see anything resembling strong evidence from Gorski
At least, if he has such evidence he hasn’t published it yet, preferring to publish a mixture of whiny blog articles where he takes a swipe at Burzynski, tiny-mind series, unimpressive basic science, and the like in bottom-feeding blog articles, some of which aren’t even indexed in PubMed
Nor is a conspiracy of cowardice—excuse me, “The Skeptics”—the reason why trying to ignore criticism will boomerang on “The Skeptics”
It’s all because of their own behavior and willingness to distort, misinform, and slime Burzynski
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “As you might recall, antineoplastons are chemicals that Burzynski found in the urine of cancer patients and that (or so he claims)”
====================================== [36] – 2/19/2013 – Seriously, Gorski ?
Where did you come up with that ?
After comparing the blood of healthy people to the blood of people with cancer, Dr. Burzynski found that people with cancer have lower amounts of a certain group of chemicals
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “None of this would have been too bad if only he had actually bothered to do the proper science and clinical trials to demonstrate that antineoplastons (1) have significant anti-cancer activity and (2) have acceptable levels of toxicity”
====================================== [10] – 8/8/2013 – Here’s (1)
—————————————————————— [37] – 2/19/2013 – And (2)
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “Oh, sure, he has a bunch of clinical trials listed on ClinicalTrials.gov, but virtually all of them are listed as having “unknown” status, and it’s unclear whether most, if any, of them are actually accruing”
====================================== [38] – 5/21/2011 – Cancer Breakthrough: 50-60% Success Rate, Cures the Incurable
May 21, 2011
12 phase 2 clinical trials have been successfully completed under supervision of FDA, and now conducting 3 phase 3 clinical trials
Or I can cite from Burzynski’s Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC) filings re his phase 2 clinical trials like you did [1] – 6/5/2013
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “In any case, Merola named the sequel what he named it … along with a website full of a “sourced transcript” to be used by Burzynski minions and shills everywhere to attack any skeptic who dares to speak out”
====================================== [39] – Gorski, you should have used the “sourced transcript” so you didn’t end up embarrassing yourself as much as you have
Actually, no one who is an apologist for Dr. Gorski, a.k.a. “Orac,” who over years ago unleashed MUD-targeted therapy on unsuspecting cancer patients, much likes Burzynski
It’s not surprising
Basically, Gorski’s a hack
—————————————————————— [40] – Or, you can use this – Burzynski: The Movie — Illustrated Screenplay and Screencap Gallery (Nader Library):
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “Part of the reason that Eric Merola doesn’t like me, aside from the fact that I am willing to help publicize Bob Blaskiewicz’s present to Dr. Burzynski for his 70th birthday on January 23, is that I think that every so often I happen to run into stories about the bad science and unethical nature of Burzynski’s work, and I blog about it”
====================================== [41] – 3/26/2013 – Maybe Eric does NOT like you because part of that “present” was your “pal” saying:
“The Burzynski clinic is a place you go to die”
—————————————————————— [42] – 8/24/2013 – Gorski, where were you when these 374 children died of brain cancer in #ScienceBasedMedicine clinical trials ?
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “I also run into patient stories”
“Although I don’t cover them as systematically as Bob does, I like to think that what I lack in comprehensiveness of coverage I make up for with my in-depth knowledge of cancer science and treatment”
====================================== [43] – 8/31/2013 – Your “in-depth knowledge of cancer science and treatment” ?
You sure have NOT presented a very strong case for that
Is your “man-crush”, Robert J. “Bob” Blaskiewicz still adding false statements to his “stories” ?
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “There are a number of things about this documentary that one can learn if one is involved in caner care and knowledgeable about Stanislaw Burzynski”
“Indeed, he’s even taken credit for pioneering the concept of personalized cancer therapy based on genes and the concept that cancer is a genetic disease, claiming to have published a journal article about it 20 years ago, allegedly long before conventional scientists and oncologists even thought of it”
“The problem, of course, is that, as far as I can tell, he published no such paper and personalized therapy is a concept older than 20 years”
====================================== [44] – 7/26/2013 – Indeed, from my perspective Gorski’s an egomaniac, full of the arrogance of ignorance about things like Burzynski’s “personalized cancer therapy”, prone to contemptuously dismissing anyone who has the temerity to question the Great and Powerful “Orac” is god
Because I was able to find the publication with NO problem
“Orac’s” Oracolytes remind me of the “believer” who said:
“god said it, and I believe it, so that settles it”
Of course, “Orac” is Oz tends to clam up when questioned by people who are NOT likely to be sycophants, toadies, and lackeys
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “Given that these are all phase II studies, it’s hard to believe that the FDA would allow Burzynski to keep them open over 13 years, but apparently it has”
====================================== [45] – 7/26/2013 – Gorski, why don’t you ask the FDA?
3/29/1996 Then United States Food and Drug Administration Commissioner, David Kessler told the American people:
“The … FDA’s initiatives … will allow …the agency … to rely on smaller trials … fewer patients … if there is evidence … of partial response in clinical trials”
—————————————————————— [46] – 6/7/2013 – Then you could be like Blatherskitewicz and do this:
Bob Blaskiewicz (@rjblaskiewicz)
6/3/13, 3:49 PM
@FauxSkeptic @bbc5live I believe he said, “Put up or shut up, you little bitch.” Something like that.
rjblaskiewicz: @bbc5live “I believe he said
“Put up or shut up
you little bitch”
BB: why not check with the @US_FDA
#Burzynski
BBC Panorama
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – “Finally, why doesn’t Burzynski offer Seán his “personalized gene-targeted cancer therapy.””
“It probably wouldn’t be that big a deal to get the blocks of tissue from Seán’s biopsy and have them analyzed”
“Yes, inquiring minds do want to know”
====================================== [35] – 1/14/2013 – Gorski, why don’t you cite the applicable phase 2 and / or phase 3 clinical trial publications of FDA approved drugs for “inoperable brainstem glioma” ?
And while your at it, is the “girl from England” referred to in your article, the same one that is referred to in Burzynski 2 ?
====================================== [47] – 1/7/2013 – “That’s why I’m joining P.Z. Myers in asking you to help make Stanislaw Burzynski pay cold hard cash to a worthy cause
====================================== [41] – 3/26/2013 – Yes Gorski, your “pal” E.Z. P.Z. who wrote:
“The Burzynski clinic is a place you go to die”
He has no shame
But at least ya’ll raised money for a worthy cause while at the same time bringing attention to yourself and what I consider to be your incredibly unethical behavior
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “In fact, from my perspective, it appears to me as though over the last few years Dr. Burzynski has pivoted”
“No longer are antineoplastons the center of attention at his clinic”
“Rather, these days, he appears to be selling something that he calls “personalized gene-targeted cancer therapy.””
====================================== [48] – 4/26/2013 – Gorski it’s great to see you’ve been paying attention
” … in 1997, his medical practice was expanded to include traditional cancer treatment options such as
chemotherapy,
gene targeted therapy,
immunotherapy and
hormonal therapy
in response to FDA requirements that cancer patients utilize more traditional cancer treatment options in order to be eligible to participate in the Company’s antineoplaston clinical trials”
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “Finally, around the 4:30 mark, we see Dr. Gregory Burzynski, Dr. Burzynski’s son, talking about genomic profiling of cancers and biomarkers in the blood and in circulating tumor cells. … plus a claim that surgery will no longer be necessary for surgery, what’s left over doesn’t sound too different from what quite a few “conventional” cancer researchers say about “personalized medicine.””
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – Gorski, “surgery will no longer be necessary for surgery” ?
Is this “attention to detail”” related to:
“because of the positions I hold at an NCI-designated comprehensive cancer center” ?
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “Clearly, the producer went to great lengths to make Burzynski’s lab look like any other molecular and cell biology lab–even like my lab”
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – Gorski, are you trying to suggest that the producer rented or bought equipment to produce this look ?
Do you know how ridiculous that sounds ?
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “When we do this we have a very good chance to have positive results in most patients”
“SS: How many respond?”
“SB: About 85 per cent for whom we have the proper gene signature; about 15 percent do not respond”
“In our responders many of them have tumors which disappear completely and in others the tumors remain small”
“The problem is finding the genetic signature because for many of these different genetic signatures we don’t have blood tests…yet”
“Note that at the time this book was published, Dr. Burzynski was claiming that he could identify who would benefit from specific targeted therapies simply from blood tests”
“If he could do this for real, Burzynski could easily publish in high impact journals like Clinical Cancer Research, the Journal of Clinical Oncology, or another high impact clinical cancer journal”
“Heck, a result like that could probably make it into general medical journals, such as the New England Journal of Medicine or The Lancet, which have an even higher impact factor”
“If he were able to demonstrate that his method of testing tumors and picking targeted therapy could result in a complete response rate anywhere near 85% for breast cancer, even more so”
“If, as he claims later in the chapter, Dr. Burzynski has patients with pancreatic cancer and advanced liver cancer whose tumors have disappeared within two months after he began treatment, the same would be true”
“If, as Burzynski claims, he achieves a 50% complete response rate in advanced brain tumors, again, the same would be true”
“He doesn’t submit his results to these journals”
“Why not?”
====================================== [3] – 7/18/2013 – Gorski, why would Burzynski want to publish in The Lancet when you saw the lame excuse they gave in Burzynski 2 for NOT publishing Burzynski’s results; which YOU have refused to address ?
Maybe you could find out if you visited the Burzynski Clinic
Oh, wait
You’ve said that people do NOT need to go to the Clinic to learn things
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “Gene-targeted cancer therapy is currently in its infancy and, except in rare situations outside of the existing currently validated biomarkers (such as HER2, ER, c-kit, and other genes for which targeted therapies exist) for the response of specific cancers, is not to be undertaken outside of the context of a clinical trial“
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – Gorski, that’s all well and good for you to write, but you provide NO citation, reference, or link in support of your statement, and you’ve proven that what you post can NOT be trusted
Try again
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “Before discussing how the Burzynski Clinic does personalized cancer therapy, I think it’s worth looking at how real scientists do it right now”
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – Gorski, what are you implying ?
That Burzynski is NOT a “real scientist” ?
Because you stated:
“From the description above, it sounded very much to me as though Dr. Burzynski is combining various targeted agents with metronomic chemotherapy“
“I know a thing or two about metronomic chemotherapy, because I was involved in a project whose end result was to be the testing of metronomic chemotherapy against cancer and because the concept is a spinoff of the work of one of my scientific heros, the late Judah Folkman”
“Whether this is what Dr. Burzynski is doing or not with the chemotherapy part of his approach, I don’t know for sure, but it sure sounds like it“
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “Now let’s take a look at how the Burzynski Clinic does it, at least as far as I can figure out from my various sources and from Ms. Trimble”
“In response to my query about personalized gene-targeted therapy offered by the Burzynski Clinic, Ms. Trimble stated that a gene expression analysis is performed, as well as mutational analysis, FISH, immunohistochemistry for selected genes and that a blood test is also performed to measure the “concentration of proteins which are products of most important oncogenes.””
“In addition, drugs are supposedly selected based on the patient’s clinical information, standard of care, FDA indication, data from phase II and III clinical trials“
====================================== [4] – 6/3/2013 – Gee Gorski
In your 6/3/2013 article you act as if you did NOT know this
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “To support this claim, Ms. Trimble also sent me two papers from the Burzynski Clinic, both of which appeared in a journal I had never heard of before, the Journal of Cancer Therapy, which is clearly not indexed on PubMed because these papers never showed up when I searched PubMed for Burzynski”
“One described Burzynski’s approach for triple negative breast cancer (TNBC)”
====================================== [32] – 8/2011 – Gorski, why am I NOT surprised that you’re able to refer to this TNBC publication 12/13/2012, but when reviewing Sheila Herron’s TNBC case 5/28/2013, you completely ignored this publication, even though it specifically states:
“Here we report the successful treatment of metastatic TNBC with combination targeted therapy, and we discuss MDT for a group of 16 women including this patient, whose treatment was based on the same principle” (Pgs. 372-373)
How do you NOT provide a link to a previous article you wrote on the same subject, like you normally do ?
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “It turns out that perhaps the best description of what “personalized” treatment means in Dr. Burzynski’s hands comes from the Texas Medical Board’s complaint against him, which can be found in over at the Ministry of Truth or at Casewatch”
“This complaint is based on the cases of two patients”
“First, here’s Patient A, who is described in the complaint thusly:”
“1. Patient A:”
“a. In approximately May of 2008, Patient A presented to Respondent with breast cancer that had metastasized to her brain, lung, and liver”
“b. Respondent prescribed a combination of five immunotherapy agents – phenylbutyrate, erlotinib, dasatinib, vorinostat, and sorafenib-which are not approved by the Food and Drug Administration (“FDA”) for the treatment of breast cancer, and which do not meet the FDA’s regulations for the use of off-label drugs in breast cancer therapy”
“c. In combination with the five immunotherapy agents, Patient A was prescribed capecitabine, a chemotherapy agent”
“This is what’s known as “throwing everything but the kitchen sink” at the tumor without any thought of interactions, as most of these agents have no proven role in the treatment of breast cancer”
“For example, erlotinib (brand name: Tarceva) is used to treat pancreatic cancer and non-small cell lung cancer”
“It works by inhibiting the tyrosine kinase of the epidermal growth factor receptor (EGFR) and is not FDA-approved for breast cancer”
“However, it’s not unreasonable to think that it could work in breast cancer, as EGFR is believed to be important in some breast cancers, which is why this is an area of active research”
“Dasatinib (trade name: Sprycel) is also a kinase inhibitor”
“It inhibits the Src family tyrosine kinase”
“Vorinostat is a histone deacetylase inhibitor approved for use against cutaneous T-cell lymphoma”
“Finally, Sorafenib is another tyrosine kinase inhibitor that inhibits the tyrosine kinases of different receptors, as well as raf kinases”
“The big problem with this sort of approach is that the more drugs you add, no matter how “targeted” they are, the more chance for interactions that increase toxicity, and throwing all these kinase inhibitors together in a cocktail with chemotherapy is a recipe for disaster, particularly because such cocktails haven’t been tested in proper phase I clinical trials to evaluate toxicity”
====================================== Gorski, you make it sound like you reviewed the medical literature and found NO phase I clinical trials were conducted, or NO combinations of some of these drugs were tested
But you do NOT reveal your research
I’m guessing you reviewed these pre 5/2008 publications, right ?
—————————————————————— [49] – 4/20/2007 – Phase III study:erlotinib in combination with cisplatin and gemcitabine in advanced non-small-cell lung cancer
—————————————————————— [50] – 5/2007 – randomized phase II study: sorafenib/erlotinib – advanced non-small-cell lung cancer
—————————————————————— [51] – 4/20/2006 – Phase II study: capecitabine and erlotinib
—————————————————————— [52] – 1/2008 – Phase II Clinical Trial: Sorafenib
—————————————————————— [53] – 4/2007 – Antitumor Activity: Sorafenib – 4 Phase I Trials: Advanced Refractory Solid Tumors
—————————————————————— [54] – 6/20/2007 – phase I study: vorinostat (VOR) in combination with capecitabine (CAP) – advanced solid tumors
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “In any case, as we have seen, Dr. Burzynski does give chemotherapy”
“Lots of chemotherapy”
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – Gorski, what was the date of the video you quoted above, about low-dose chemotherapy ?
====================================== [23] – 12/13/2012 – “Instead, skirting the line between science and pseudoscience, Dr. Burzynski gives every appearance of recklessly throwing together untested combinations of targeted agents willy-nilly to see if any of them stick but without having a systematic plan to determine when or if he has successfully matched therapy to genetic abnormality”
====================================== [15] – 5/17/2011 – That sure explains away the review of the medical literature (phase 2 and 3 clinical trials)
NOT
====================================== [55] – 12/12/2012 – “Note: Orac is away In the meantime, he is rerunning some of his favorite posts”
“Given that the blog seems to have been infiltrated with Burzynski trolls again now seems a perfect time to rerun a post of Orac’s from about a year ago”
====================================== [55] – 12/12/2012 – “Orac”, who’s the idiot who posted that “trolls” had taken over the blog, and who were these “alleged”“trolls” ?
Inquiring minds want to know
====================================== [55] – 12/12/2012 – “No one would ever confuse my reviews with those of Roger Ebert (mine tend to be a lot longer, for one thing, and concentrate on science much more than moviemaking), but I do sometimes subject myself to these movies when I can find a way to watch them online that doesn’t cost me any money”
====================================== [55] – 12/12/2012 – Gorski
“Concentrate on science” ?
really ?
Really ??
REALLY ???
Did you actually count how many characters and / or words you devoted to criticism instead of “science” ?
====================================== [55] – 12/12/2012 – “In the process, I might even look into a couple of Burzynski’s studies that I’ve read and found to be–well–lacking, to put it kindly”
====================================== [2] – 8/4/2013 – Gorski, why don’t you “look into” Burzynski’s 2003-2010 preliminary phase 2 clinical trial reports, and write a “review” ?
====================================== [55] – 12/12/2012 – “One part of the movie that truly insults the intelligence of anyone with a modicum of knowledge about drug therapy occurs near the beginning of the movie”
“It’s a part that, as a cancer surgeon who is interested in targeted therapies for breast cancer, I found particularly idiotic”
“First, there is a screen with this caption:”
“Antineoplastons target the specific genes that allow cancer to grow and flourish”
“A little later we see:”
“There are currently over 25 FDA-approved gene-targeted cancer drugs on the market today”
“Many of them can only target single genes”
“All of which is true but irrelevant if Burzynski is trying to sell antineoplastons as targeted therapy”
“Now here’s the kicker:”
“Antineoplastons work on close to one hundred different genes”
“You know what you call a drug that works on “close to 100 genes”?”
“I don’t know either, but you don’t call it a “targeted” therapy unless all those genes are genes affected by the single target being inhibited; i.e., are downstream targets of the gene targeted by antineoplastons”
====================================== [5] – 8/21/2013 – Gorski, how do you NOT know “the single target being inhibited … are downstream targets of the gene targeted by antineoplastons”, when you did NOT even know which of Burzynski’s publications discussed which genes are “targeted by antineoplastons” ?
====================================== [56] – 12/5/2012 – “In reality, oncologists shun Burzynski—and rightly so, given that he has yet to publish anything resembling a convincing result suggesting the efficacy of his antineoplastons against cancer”
“It’s painfully obvious from this paragraph that Burzynski doesn’t know academic oncologists”
“The reason oncologists don’t respect Burzynski is because of how he hasn’t show that his treatments work better than conventional treatments—or even that they work at all—and because of the way he abuses patients by charging them huge sums of money to participate in a clinical trial”
“Those are the reasons legitimate oncologists, at least those familiar with Burzynski, look askance at him”
“How could they do otherwise?”
“The ones who don’t take him seriously are the ones who know him best”
====================================== [57] – 4/24/2013 – Gorski, that certainly explains why this 2011 cancer study that references Burzynski:
Phase II trial of tipifarnib and radiation in children with newly diagnosed diffuse intrinsic pontine gliomas
University of California—San Francisco
Children’s Hospital Boston, Massachusetts
St Jude Children’s Research Hospital, Memphis, Tennessee
Seattle Children’s Hospital, Seattle, Washington
Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania
Children’s Hospital of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania
Children’s National Medical Center, Washington, DC
Cincinnati Children’s Hospital Medical Center, Ohio
======================================
British Journal of Cancer (2010) 103, 1680–1691. doi:10.1038/sj.bjc.6605969
Published online 2 November 2010 http://www.nature.com/bjc/journal/v103/n11/full/6605969a.html
Experimental Pharmacology Unit, Department of Research, Istituto Nazionale Tumori, National Cancer Institute Fondazione G, Via.M Semmola, Pascale, Napoli, Italy
====================================== [26] – 4/2012
Phase I–II study of vorinostat plus paclitaxel and bevacizumab in metastatic breast cancer: evidence for vorinostat-induced tubulin acetylation and Hsp90 inhibition in vivo http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22200869/
Breast Cancer Res Treat. 2012 Apr;132(3):1063-72. doi: 10.1007/s10549-011-1928-x. Epub 2011 Dec 27 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/m/pubmed/22200869/
Breast Cancer Res Treat. Author manuscript; available in PMC 2013 April.1 http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC3486521/
Published in final edited form as:
Breast Cancer Res Treat. 2012 April; 132(3): 1063–1072
Didymus Judas Thomas' Hipocritical Oath Blog 