New look and a good book

My remaining hair was starting to look pretty silly so last Friday I had my head shaved (thanks Arlan!).  It actually feels pretty good though I am amazed at how even a little bit of hair had been keeping my head warm.  Definitely stocking cap season for the next few months.

Since my surgery I have had quite a few books passed my way.  Because our friends span a pretty broad range of perspectives, the books have as well.  Everything from Mary Baker Eddy's "Science and Health" to Randy Pausch's "The Last Lecture."  Several of the book have, almost inevitably, focused on alternative cancer therapies and I am always struck by the outright hostility to scientific evidence displayed in many of these books.  Ray Newman passed along a book by David Servan-Schreiber entitled "Anticancer: a new way of life" and at a quick first glance I mistook it to be another science hostile alternative approach (though coming from Ray I should have known better) .  A couple weeks later, I received another copy of the same book from Stephen Dampier and with two 'endorsements' from good people thought I had better take a closer look.

What I found was a really refreshing read that focuses on complementary rather than alternative approaches to fighting cancer. The author does not disparage conventional treatments (indeed they saved his life!) but he advocates evidence-based complementary changes in behavior that can augment the usual medical approaches.  His writing on diet and cancer is especially compelling and, most impressively, his recommendations are supported rich and well-documented empirical evidence.  The down side of this, of course, it that it made me realize just how cancer-friendly the typical American diet really can be.  Indeed, the author cites (p. 101) another researcher who claims that

"With all I have learned over these years of research, if I were asked to design a diet today that that promoted the development of cancer to the maximum, I couldn't improve on our present diet."  

Kind of depressing and certainly doesn't do much to maintain my appetite!

The role of sugars and major shifts in Omega 6 to Omega 3 fatty ratios feature prominently in Servan-Schreiber's analysis of anti-cancer foods and his arguments convince me that we should all make major changes in our eating habits.  While his thoughts on the anti-cancer mind and the anti-cancer body strike me as somewhat less compelling, they are still pretty interesting and definitely merit consideration.  Overall, I'd encourage everyone to read this book (especially Chapter 8 on Anticancer Foods) and I want to thank Ray and Stephen for putting it in front of us (Lenore has read most of it and also found it both accessible and convincing). /dps