What Patients Need to Know About Natural vs. Conventional Breast Cancer Treatment

If you have recently received a breast cancer diagnosis, you likely want to learn everything you possibly can about your treatment options and all of the possible side effects of different treatments.

You have probably heard of friends and family members who had a hard experience with radiation therapy, chemotherapy, or surgery for breast cancer and might be wondering whether natural treatments for breast cancer might work better for you. This explains everything you need to know about breast cancer treatment in Australia.

First, we want to define the different kinds of treatments:

• Standard treatments are based on scientific evidence from research studies.
• Alternative medicine includes techniques that are used instead of standard treatments.
• Complementary medicine includes any treatment options that are used along with standard medical treatments.
• Integrative medicine refers to a total approach to care that mixes standard medical treatment with complementary and alternative medicine treatments that are shown to be safe and effective in addressing the mental, physical, and spiritual parts of a patient’s health.

Standard treatment, also known as conventional treatment or a standard of care, includes traditional treatments like chemotherapy, radiation therapy, surgery, and precision medicine. When patients talk about the natural treatment, they are usually talking about complementary therapies or alternative treatments, including dietary supplements, acupuncture, cannabis, or botanicals, that are not part of the accepted standard of care for treating breast cancer.

Common natural treatments for breast cancer

There are a couple of common natural treatment approaches for breast cancer, including:

• Medical marijuana. There are no scientific studies out there that offer evidence that cannabis or CBD oil can cure or even treat breast cancer, and the U.S. Food and Drug Administration has not approved cannabis as a medical treatment. That being said, the Food and Drug Administration has approved cannabinoid prescription medications to treat side effects of cancer and its treatment, including neuropathic pain, nausea, vomiting, and the loss of appetite.
• Intermittent fasting. Intermittent fasting refers to only eating during particular periods of time within a week or a day, and it has become a fairly common approach to weight loss. Some researchers have suggested that intermittent fasting might also offer specific health benefits, like protecting against chronic diseases and decreasing systemic inflammation. That being said, fasting can also lead to fatigue, nausea, insomnia, and headaches, side effects that can be very hard for patients to tolerate on top of the side effects of breast cancer and its treatment. You should speak to your doctor or medical team before trying intermittent fasting since the efficacy of intermittent fasting depends on you and your specific situation.

Keep in mind that research shows that patients that choose natural or complementary medicine are more likely to delay or even reject some kinds of conventional treatment, which can lead to worse cancer outcomes. One study showed that women with nonmetastatic breast cancer that initially chose alternative medicine instead of conventional breast cancer treatment had more than a fivefold increased risk of death over women that immediately chose conventional treatment.