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Comprehensive Cancer Care Conference History

Each year, the Comprehensive Cancer Care Conference has grown more interesting, more authoritative, and larger. Comprehensive Cancer Care 2001 represents another step in the evolution of our work.

In 1998, for the first time, The Center for Mind-Body Medicine brought those who were doing the most promising research on complementary and alternative therapies for cancer together with the leaders in the mainstream cancer care and oncology research. Clinicians, patients, researchers, policy makers, family members and citizen advocates - 900 people in all - came. We provided practical overviews of nutrition and mind-body therapies for clinicians, cutting edge research on Chinese medicine, state of the art reviews of the data on shark cartilage, and the trophoblastic theory of cancer. We presented research on Chinese herbal therapies that would, two years later, be discussed and praised at ASCO, and we offered an opportunity for Dr. Nicholas Gonzalez and Stansislaw Burzynski to present their work. The National Cancer Institute, NIH's Office of Alternative Medicine and the American Cancer Society all worked with us on the meeting.

We created a new form in that first conference: CAM researchers and clinicians presenting their work to critical and open-minded mainstream oncologists and researchers. Comprehensive Cancer Care became the place to go to get the best information about which CAM therapies work and which don't, and how those that do can be best integrated into programs of comprehensive care.

In 1999, we added two days of pre-conference workshops to make it possible for clinicians to have in depth learning experiences about the best programs of comprehensive and integrative care, and to provide intensive training in the use of nutritional and mind-body therapies, and of guided imagery. Comprehensive cancer centers sent representatives tot share the programs they were developing with one another, and with administrators and clinicians from community cancer centers as well.

At Comprehensive Cancer Care 2000 we expanded the number of concurrent sessions and repeated them to maximize the possibilities for attendance; presented a full range of poster sessions, and attracted more that 50 exhibitors, 1400 people came, among them three times more oncologists than in either of the previous years. There were commentators from the NCI and from many of the nation's leading cancer centers. The National Cancer Institute and the National Center for Complementary and Alternative Medicine cosponsored the conference and presented a full program to help investigators develop and advance their research.

In 2001, with co-sponsorship from the American Cancer Society and full participation of our distinguished Advisory Council, we worked closely with presenters and commentators, helping them to present their data in the clearest way possible. We developed a core curriculum on complementary therapies - mind-body approaches, group support, nutrition, Chinese Medicine, yoga and Qi Gong, and spiritual interventions - and a focus on the most promising new research on mind-body therapies. Expert panels addressed such controversies as the use of antioxidants with chemotherapy and radiation, and whether or not soy should be included in treatment plans for breast cancer patients. There were critical evaluations of the "state of the art" of hyperthermia, omega-3 fatty acids, natural angiogenesis blockers, and emotional factors in cancer progression, as well as a panel on integrative approaches to symptom management, CAM and nursing care, nutritional treatment for brain cancer, and cancer and the environment. There were follow-ups on ground breaking studies by Sophie Chen, PhD., Nicholas Gonzalez, MD, David Spiegel, MD, and Alexander Sun, Ph.D. Keynote speakers included Nancy Brinker, William Fair, MD, Michael Lerner, Ph.D., Dean Ornish, MD, Rachel Naomi Remen, M.D. David Rosenthal, MD, David Spiegel, MD and Stephen Straus, MD. There were more pre-conference workshops, 25 concurrent seminars, each of which was repeated, more poster sessions, and a bigger exhibit hall.

The Exhibit Hall gave opportunities for manufacturers of products and providers of services and information used in mainstream cancer care to reach those who are integration CAM therapies. It will also offer those with CAM products, services and information an opportunity to educate the mainstream cancer community that is just beginning to integrate CAM products and services. On-site sales are permitted.

In addition to exhibit booths with both mainstream and CAM products, the hall featured:

• a bookstore
• poster sessions form promising researchers
• a variety of experiential activities such as therapeutic massage
• food stations
• and a welcoming reception for all attendees

The information, connections, and experiences at these conferences was very valuable to the community, and unforgettable to many. It was an incredible learning experience for the Center. We made many valuable connections and brought together the cancer community in a way that has never been done before or since. The information from these trainings was synthesized and the CancerGuides^® Professional Training was born. This training is still offering the most up-to-date research on Cancer therapies, and the best place for professionals looking to expand their capabilities to talk with their patients about Cancer.

The 2003 conference deepened many of the themes developed in the earlier meetings and extended the spectrum of presentations. There were a number of new research sessions on the use of Chinese medicine and western nutritional herbal therapies and on the spiritual dimension of cancer care. Updates were presented by Drs. Burzynski and Gonzalez on their widely used and controversial therapies, together with thoughtful critiques by mainstream oncologists. The core curriculum of integrative care—mind-body approaches, nutrition, group support, exercise, touch therapies and massage and Chinese medicine along with scientific evidence supporting these approaches.—was presented two times so that more participants could attend the session. Leaders of programs of integrative care at major academic institutions including Harvard, MD Anderson and Memorial Sloan Kettering presented their programs. So too did clinical directors of independent, integrative clinics including Keith Block, MD, Tim Birdsall, ND and Mitchell Gaynor, MD.

Once again, the director of NCI’s Office of Cancer Complementary and Alternative Medicine, oncologist Jeffrey White, MD and his deputy Wendy Smith, Ph.D participated in the development of the conference and in a number of plenary and breakout sessions. They and their colleagues at the National Cancer Institute offered a number of sessions designed to assist clinicians in finding the best information about CAM approaches, developing research projects and obtaining funding for their studies. As in each of the previous conferences, Sen. Tom Harkin who has long championed the development of integrative care, welcomed participants. Steven Strauss, MD director of the National Center for Complimentary and Alternative Medicine delivered an opening address. Ben Carson, MD the celebrated Johns Hopkins pediatric neurosurgeon, delivered a stirring keynote on the role of nutrition, energy medicine and spiritual healing, together with conventional care in his approach to his own prostate cancer.

Controversial topics including the use of antioxidants with chemotherapy and radiation, and novel uses of laboratory testing for the prevention and early diagnosis of cancer were discussed at length. And there were powerful pre-conference workshops on music; therapeutic touch and energy medicine; Ayurveda; and a spiritual approach to death and dying. And, as in each past conference, a patient panel offered a variety of perspectives on choosing CAM therapies, developing healing partnerships and finding and creating programs of integrative care.

All told, well over 100 presenters, commentators and moderators gave of their time, their expertise and themselves to make this 5^th year a groundbreaking personal and profound success; to catalyze significant advances in the development of integrative cancer care for all; and to justify The New Yorker’s recent assessment that, The Center for Mind-Body Medicine’s Comprehensive Cancer Care Conference is “the most important alternative medical meeting in America”.