Hope and a question

[charlesual]

Hi fellow travelers,

3 years ago. 57 year old guy. I discovered my PSA to be 13.6, biopsy revealed 2 Gleason 4+4 and 2 4+5. RP followed and 4 months later salvage lymphectomy near prostate bed, then SBRT of prostate bed and 18 months of lupron and proton beam of two bone Mets. Massive lifestyle change (only plant based diet, no sugar very occasional sip of wine, weekly vitamin C 125 gram infusions,

I‘m been doing the care oncology protocol with good results. Im now flat lined at .24 PSA

I Went from stage IV with rapid doubling time to almost undetectable. It’s been a journey, I put picked up a penile prosthesis along the way and life is pretty good again. I’m very grateful for some really great care from Dr Kwon at Mayo and all the wisdom here. I feel very optimistic I’ll die of something other then PC.

Question, is there a good place to order some unprescribed meds? I’m looking for another variant of dewormer called Itraconazole. Seems like the pharmas are making it increasingly difficult to get meds.

TIA,

Charlie

[Tall_Allen]

This stuff has known serious toxicity, so it would have to have some real benefit to have a therapeutic ratio worth pursuing. Unfortunately, it doesn't. It only seems to have any effect at high doses at which the toxicities were serious, and even then, the effect is "modest."

"High-dose itraconazole (600 mg/day) has modest antitumor activity in men with metastatic CRPC...Common toxicities included fatigue, nausea, anorexia, rash, and a syndrome of hypokalemia, hypertension, and edema."

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articl...

"However, the magnitude of effect is modest, and treatment carries risk of toxicities associated with mineralocorticoid excess...The most common adverse events were edema (52%), fatigue (38%), hypertension (24%), and hypokalemia (24%).

ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/303...

A related drug, ketoconazole, was used for years before Zytiga became available. They inhibit an enzyme used in the adrenal glands to synthesize androgens. They have high liver toxicity. Zytiga was much more powerful. It is possible that some of the side effects would be mitigated by replacement prednisone. The claim is that it inhibits "hedgehog signaling" - a growth pathway for cancer. Usually, when one pathway is blocked, the cancer just finds another pathway. There are trials for more powerful and specific hedgehog signalling inhibitors (e.g., cyclopamine, Vismodegib, Sonidegib)

In fact, I tried it (at lower doses) for basal cell carcinoma. It did nothing for me, but perhaps a higher dose might. I decided to avoid the side effects and just get them scraped off.

[charlesual in reply to Tall_Allen]

Thanks Tall_Allen, you always give me lots to think about!! You are gifted my friend.

[LearnAll]

Glad to hear you are doing so well. Wish you a very long life. How much credit you give

to care protocol and other Natural anticancer interventions to keep your PSA so low ?

And what meds of care protocol you are on ? Why you want to change from Mebendazole to Itraconazole. Isn't Itraconazole an antifungal med just like ketoconazole ? Your answer will be greatly appreciated.

[charlesual in reply to LearnAll]

Thanks LearnAll. Hard to say what specifically is keeping my PSA low. I can’t really say it’s any one thing or all the above. I just figured I’ll keep doing what I’m doing and regularly check my PSA and liver function. I have no side effects whatsoever. I anticipate I’ll take a break from the care oncology at some point at Dr Zhangs direction. I’m presently taking

1. Metformin Extended Release 500mg 3 tablets twice daily with meals for 90 days

2. Atorvastatin 80mg (two 40mg tablets) every bedtime for 90 days

3. Cycle: Mebendazole 100mg daily with breakfast or lunch for 30 days, then Doxycycline 100mg daily with breakfast or lunch for 30 days, then Mebendazole 100mg daily for 30 days.

Thanks for the feedback on Itraconazole. I need to do some more research. I came across this study for reference.

Repurposing Drugs in Oncology (ReDO)—itraconazole as an anti-cancer agent

15 Apr 2015

Pan Pantziarka, Vidula Sukhatme, Gauthier Bouche, Lydie Meheus, Vikas P Sukhatme

Itraconazole, a common triazole anti-fungal drug in widespread clinical use, has evidence of clinical activity that is of interest in oncology. There is evidence that at the clinically relevant doses, itraconazole has potent anti-angiogenic activity, and that it can inhibit the Hedgehog signalling pathway and may also induce autophagic growth arrest. The evidence for these anticancer effects, in vitro, in vivo, and clinical are summarised, and the putative mechanisms of their action outlined. Clinical trials have shown that patients with prostate, lung, and basal cell carcinoma have benefited from treatment with itraconazole, and there are additional reports of activity in leukaemia, ovarian, breast, and pancreatic cancers. Given the evidence presented, a case is made that itraconazole warrants further clinical investigation as an anti-cancer agent. Additionally, based on the properties summarised previously, it is proposed that itraconazole may synergise with a range of other drugs to enhance the anti-cancer effect, and some of these possible combinations are presented in the supplementary materials accompanying this paper.

Thanks again

[LearnAll in reply to charlesual]

Thanks for the details. I had a talk with my Uro about antifungal medicine use. He told me that in severe cases of PCa where bone marrow is in danger, many oncologists use ketoconazole (a antifungal medicine) This med didnot become mainstream due to its serious side effects. We need to carefully read and understand antifungal meds and their potential side effects. My Uro didnot dispute the efficacy of ketoconazole though.

He just warned about severe side effects.

[charlesual in reply to LearnAll]

Good info. Thanks again

[paige20180 in reply to LearnAll]

Learn All- Care Oncology added Itraconazole in addition to mebendazole. Charlies liver function is not showing any stress at all from the protocol so we are stepping things up to try to get his PSA to keep going down.

I think the SBRT to two bone metastasis at Mayo gets most (and maybe all the credit) but feel all the other things he’s doing may also be the reason, finally PSA stable and we are resting easy after 2.5 terrifying years.

We’ve had 3 terrifying episodes with his cancer running away. When his PSA goes up, it doesn’t go gently. He’ll double in two weeks. So for him to be on no medications except the Care Oncology protocol, is promising from where we’ve been in the past.

[Napper01]

Charlie, go to Indonesia or Vietnam, you can buy anything over the counter.