Daily Mail - 30.07.2019

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Daily Mail, Tuesday, July 30, 2019

was determined to explore all
the options.
In addition to her medical
degree, she has a second degree
in human cell biology.
‘In the couple of years before I
was diagnosed, I had done a lot
of reading around the effects of
old drugs such as metformin and
had got interested in how they
work,’ she says.
Lisa also came across a book,
How To Starve Cancer Without
Starving Yourself, in which
author Jane McLelland, a trained
physiotherapist, reveals how she
used a combination of metformin
and other ‘old’ drugs after
cervical cancer spread to her
lungs 20 years ago.
At the time, Jane, a mother of
two, was given a 5 per cent
chance of survival. Now 55, she
lives in Fulham, West London,
has been in remission since 2004
and still takes metformin.
While her NHS oncologist pre-
scribed her a new chemotherapy
drug, palbociclib, Lisa is also
taking metformin as part of
small cocktail of ‘old’ metabolic
drugs thought to interrupt the

‘feeding’ of cancer cells. This

cocktail includes aspirin and

a statin normally given to

control cholesterol.

‘They don’t expect palbociclib

to reduce the tumour but to halt

further progression for three to

four years,’ says Lisa. ‘But when

my doctors examined me in

March this year, while there was

no new progression of any of the

tumours, there was also a little

bit of shrinkage.

‘I’m assuming everything I’m

doing may have contributed to

starving some cancer cells and

caused this reduction,’ she says.

THE SPECIALISTS

STRUCK BY RESULTS

ANoTHer patient who says

she’s benefited from metformin

is Joanne Myatt, a 43-year-old

social worker from Chorley, Lan-

cashire. She was initially treated

for breast cancer in 2006, but

three years ago the disease

returned to her liver and bones.

‘I wrote myself off,’ she says.

She started taking metformin

nine months ago (in addition to

having conventional treatment)

‘and there’s been some shrink-

age of the tumour in my liver’.

‘I’m not saying the metformin

is a cure, but I do believe it’s

doing something.’

Mary Nike, 62, an IT consultant

from Brewood, Staffordshire,

who was diagnosed with

advanced breast cancer in 2014,

told Good Health: ‘All the

specialists are amazed that my

cancer hasn’t spread. I think

metformin is crucial.’

Patients who use such drugs

have to find sympathetic doctors

prepared to offer them on

private prescription.

Lisa is being treated at the

Care oncology Clinic in London,

one of the only centres in the UK

to offer this so-called ‘cancer-

starving’ approach.

It was set up five years ago by

Dr robin Bannister, a pharma-

ceutical scientist who’s assem-

bled a team of medical doctors

to prescribe a metabolic anti-

cancer regimen, including met-

formin, to work in tandem with

conventional chemotherapy.

‘We’re approaching cancer

treatment from a different angle,’

says Dr Bannister.

His wife, Ginnie, died in 2017,

having originally been diagnosed

with breast cancer in 2005, aged

41. It reappeared in her lungs in
    2012, but he believes the five
    years she survived were in part
    due to the additional treatment
    provided by the clinic.
    He says: ‘We’ve just published
    a study in the journal Frontiers
    in Pharmacology, showing
    average survival of 27 months in
    95 patients with advanced
    brain tumours when they
    followed our protocol, compared
    with 14 months using
    standard treatment.’
    He adds that while there are
    ‘some enlightened doctors who
    remember what they learned in
    the first year of medical school
    about cancer metabolism’, the
    mainstream view is that there is
    insufficent evidence to
    recommend metformin.
    There is also the suggestion
    that the cancer industry itself is
    not interested in pursuing this
    re-purposing of old drugs.
    ‘Metformin does slow down
    tumour growth and gives a
    survival benefit of a few months,
    which is comparable to a lot of
    the £100,000 cancer drugs,’ says
    cancer specialist Karol Sikora,
    dean of medicine at the
    University of Buckingham.
    ‘But it is very cheap and no one
    doing a trial would get their
    money back by extra sales —
    that’s why there is little interest
    in promoting it.’
    Author Jane McLelland
    concurs: ‘There is a colossal
    resistance from the medical and
    pharmaceutical establishment
    to these treatments because
    there is no money in them.
    ‘old drugs cost a few pence

Treatment: Dr Lisa McGrath

and (left) Mary Nike and

Jane McLelland (below)

of the

5 best

of the

best

GUT PRODUCTS

Gut problems can be both

uncomfortable and embarrassing.

Here, Dr Simon Smale, a

consultant gastroenterologist at

York teaching Hospital NHS

Foundation trust, selects

five of the best remedies.

FOR CONSTIPATION

Movicol Plain Powder sachets, £14

for 30 sachets, chemistdirect.co.uk

THIS would be my

first-line approach for

constipation, as it has

macrogol, which is an

osmotic laxative — it

works by causing water

to be retained in the bowel for

longer, allowing it to hydrate the

stool, making it softer and easier

to pass. It takes a day or two to take

effect (if it makes no difference after

three days, you should see your GP).

FOR EXCESS WIND

Alflorex PrecisionBiotics,

£24.99 for 30 capsules, boots.com

WE HAVE trillions of bacte-

ria in our large bowel.

When these are exposed

to certain sugars, they

ferment and produce

gases. Alflorex is a good

starting point for

flatulence, as there is evidence it

reduces sensitivity in the bowel,

making us feel less windy.

FOR DIARRHOEA

Imodium Instants, £3.59 for

six tablets, superdrug.com

DIARRHOEA is often

the result of a bowel

infection caused by a

virus or bacteria,

when the regular

movement, secretion

and absorption of fluid in the intes-

tines is disrupted and we have

watery stools. These fast-dissolving

tablets contain loperamide, which

slows gut contractions and allows

more fluid to be absorbed in the

colon, thus making stools more

normal. If diarrhoea lasts for more

than seven days or blood is passed,

see your GP.

FOR BLOATING

Buscopan Cramps, £4.89 for

20 tablets, boots.com

BLOATING may be

caused by excess gas

or an oversensitivity

to normal amounts of

wind. Buscopan con-

tains hyoscine butylbromide — an

anti-spasmodic drug that relaxes the

muscle in the bowel wall, to reduce

bloating and cramps. It can cause

the heart to beat faster, so people

with palpitations should avoid it.

FOR CHILDREN & BABIES

OptiBac Live Cultures, £6.99

for ten sachets, optibac

probiotics.co.uk

THIS product specifically

for babies and children

says it contains three bil-

lion high-quality live

‘good’ bacteria in each

sachet, which could

boost the gut bacteria

that contribute to a

healthy immune system. It also

contains fructooligosaccharides,

which encourage the growth of a

diverse range of bacteria, to help

with digestion.

ADRIAN MONTI

Pictures: WARREN SMITH / CHRIS WINTER / RICHARD CANNON