Non-conventional treatments

Entirely my own opinion. It depends what you mean by treatment. Some people use treatment interchangeably with the word cure. There are no treatments available conventional or non conventional that will cure metastatic oesophageal cancer.

There are certainly treatments sometimes referred to as novel agents that are not conventional chemotherapy. Also known as personalised medicine if one’s tumour has defined characteristics that may be targeted. If the tumour has such characteristics these treatments are available on the NHS. Such agents, administered to the right patients,  can significantly prolong survival and improve quality of life. 

There are also complementary therapies that may relieve symptoms. I am thinking of reflexology that may improve the patient’s sense of well being. 

For the rest: I am cynical of any products or diets that claim clinical benefit that do not have compelling trial to support them. Especially if these treatments come at a cost. There are many accounts where authors have cherry-picked anecdotal data to support the treatment that they are promoting. One does not know, without compelling data, that the treatment rather than inhibiting cancer progression is actually facilitating it.

My own personal opinion is therefore that some patients may get a placebo effect benefit from some products or changes in lifestyle but that it is better not to tamper with conventional or therapies proven to be beneficial to the patient without the approval of their healthcare team. 

 My experience: my consultant advised me not to try any crank diets. 

Thank you. Yes we are more than aware there is no cure. We have been living with this for 15 months now, we are merely looking for something to enhance his quality of life as he is completely exhausted much  of the time, 

He is sadly not a candidate for targeted therapies. 

We thought  everything is worth investigating as until this diagnosis had no previous experience of cancer treatments and related therapies. However we may have been wrong. Thank you for your input.