Roundtable Conference at the University of British Columbia Calls for Establishment of Centre of Excellence on Complementary and Alternative Medicine Research

VANCOUVER, June 28 /CNW/ - The Malony Shrivastava Memorial Foundationbrought together, on June 24, prominent researchers, donors and financiers ofhealth research, including from the University of British Columbia, SimonFraser University, InspireHealth, and the Hecht, Michael Smith, and CanadianBreast Cancer Foundations to a Roundtable on Adjuvants to Standard Treatmentof Cancer and other aspects of complementary and alternative medicineresearch.

The focus of the discussions was on how to integrate the naturalprocesses and substances that prove beneficial into the mainstream of patientcare and prevention. The absence of methods & techniques and funding to enableprospective or retrospective studies was pinpointed despite growing number ofanecdotal accounts of significant benefits to patients. Needed are thedevelopment of methods, techniques and strategies to quantify qualitativebenefits to patients, so that studies could be published in reputed journalsand thereby pave the way for more natural methods, and substances to be usedmore widely. The participants felt that the passion, competence and energy inBC could be facilitated through the Centre to make BC a world leader oncomprehensive care.

The eminent group of researchers and stakeholders called for theestablishment of a Centre of Excellence in British Columbia to enable clinicalresearch and other studies to assess efficacy of natural substances andmethods to move forward, and to network the various researchers in theprovince.

Dr. Alison Buchan, Senior Associate Dean of Medicine, UBC, inauguratedthe Roundtable and welcomed the participants.

Dr. Nandlal Tiwari from Jaipur, India, speaking by Skype, was a physicianof Malony Shrivastava, the late wife of the Foundation's founder, Mr. PraveenShrivastava, and had treated her with Carctol, a combination of 8 differentmedicinal herbs, along with Malony's standard chemotherapy for Cancer from theBC Cancer Agency. Dr. Tiwari stated that he was seeing remission in about30-40% of patients with Carctol, and that Carctol has been administered toover 10,000 patients in India, UK and other countries where satisfactory toexcellent results were found on quality and quantity of life.

Mr. Praveen Shrivastava provided moving testimony on how well Malony wasdoing while on the combination of standard chemotherapy and Carctol. A TVinterview of Malony was played for the audience, where the patient herselfdescribed her coping skills using natural methods and substances, therebyenabling her to have had a better quality of life than many other breastcancer patients.

Dr. Sunil Chacko, the Foundation's Research Director, presented on thestate of natural health products & processes clinical trials, and urged thatmore clinical research be conducted to assess efficacy and effectiveness,including phase IV-equivalent prospective studies for natural products alreadybeing used by patients. Toxicology studies have been conducted for Carctol inthe UK and India.

Mr. Adrian Dix, M.L.A., Opposition Health Critic, stressed the value ofresearch weight brought to bear by the efforts of the Malony Foundation. Dr.Arun Chockalingam, Michael Smith Foundation and SFU, Dr. Hal Gunn, MedicalDirector of InspireHealth, Mr. Jim Dao, Founder of Genyous, Dr. Jean PaulCollet and Professor Carolyn Gotay, UBC, Ms. Julie McMillan, Canadian BreastCancer Foundation, Ms. Maureen Edwardson, InnerResonanceTechnologies, Dr.Amandah Hoogbruin, Kwantlen University, Dr. Emma Tomlinson Guns, VGH, Ms.Paula Brown, BCIT, Ms. Carole Robert, BDA Foundation, Montreal, Dr. JuliusHalaschek-Wiener, BC Cancer Agency, Ms. Sandra Mills, BC Cancer Society, Mr.Prateek Juneja, UBC, Dr. Cynthia Hamilton, VCHRI, Dr. Suzanne Slocum, UBC,were other speakers and discussants.