We sometimes get people asking if they should try alternative treatments as their sole treatment for their bladder cancer even when it is treatable by proven methods. Admittedly alternative treatments in some situations have a place along side convectional treatment, but why would you put your life on the line by placing all of your eggs in one basket?
Fear of treatment can often make people make poor choices even with no concrete reasons to think it will work. While I understand their fear I do not understand why they would chose unproven over proven treatment, one would think the fear of death would outweigh the fear of treatment. Steve Jobs story should be taken as a cautionary tale.
www.cbsnews.com/8301-18560_162-20124391/steve-jobs-revelations-from-a-tech-giant/?tag=contentMain;contentBody
"The cancer that eventually killed him was discovered accidentally while he was being checked for kidney stones back in 2004. A cat scan showed a shadow on his pancreas that turned out to be a malignant tumor.
Isaacson: And then they do a biopsy, and they're very emotional. They say this is good. It's one of these very slow-growing five percent of pancreatic cancers that can actually be cured. But Steve Jobs doesn't get operated on right away. He tries to treat it with diet. He goes to a spiritualist. He goes through various ways of-- of doing it macrobiotically, and he doesn't get an operation.
Kroft: Why doesn't he get it operated on immediately?
Isaacson: You know, I've asked him that, and he said, "I didn't want my body to be opened." And soon everybody is telling him, "Quit trying to treat it with all these roots and vegetables and things. Just get operated on." But he does it nine months later.
Kroft: Too late.
Isaacson: Well one assumes it's too late because by the time they operate on him, they notice that it has spread to the tissues around the pancreas.
Kroft: How could such a smart man do such a stupid thing?
Isaacson: Yeah, I think that he kind of felt that if you ignore something, if you don't want something to exist, you can have magical thinking. And it had worked for him in the past. He regretted it, you know, some of the decisions he made and certainly, I think he felt he should've been operated on sooner.'
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