Postby H is for Hawk » Sat Nov 07, 2015 1:09 pm
I had the RGCC blood test done when I consulted with Dr. James Forsythe in Reno, Nevada, a well known integrative oncologist. I received a list of chemotherapy agents that would and would not help me. It costs $2500 and is not covered by insurance. Ultimately, I decided to go with chemotherapy regimen recommended by Memorial Sloan Kettering because there was data backing up their plan.
Larry Weisenthal of the Weisenthal Cancer Group, a company that tests live tumor samples for the best chemo drugs has negative things to say about RGCC, that the technology can't work-
There is a laboratory in Greece - and perhaps others elsewhere, that we are not aware of - which claims the ability to test blood samples in order to identify effective treatments for patients with solid tumor types. There are compelling scientific reasons why Dr. Weisenthal and other experts have very serious concerns about this approach. The method consists of removing normal cells from blood samples. This supposedly leaves only tumor cells. The remaining cells are then cultured and passed through a flow cytometer. A flow cytometer is a machine that detects a fluorescing marker which was added to a cell sample during processing. In this case, the marker used is called “annexin.” Annexin binds to the membranes of cells which have been killed through a process called apoptosis.
Here is why that approach cannot possibly work as the laboratory claims. First, real tumor cells always clump together when they are cultured (“culturing,” as it is used here, means inducing tumor cells to multiply outside the body). Cells which have clumped-together CANNOT be interrogated with a flow cytometer, which works by passing cells through a laser light beam, one cell at a time. Secondly, the lab in question prepares the sample using what is called “negative selection.” It attempts to remove normal cells from the sample and leave behind what are hoped to be only tumor cells. Experts in the field of cell selection state that this is impossible. No negative selection methods, known to exist today, can produce a pure tumor population - or even come close to doing so. Persons knowledgable in this area agree that this method always leaves behind hundreds or thousands of normal cells for every one tumor cell obtained. Hence, any readings obtained with this method would be based mainly upon normal cells and not upon tumor cells. Data obtained with this method would be irrelevant at best. More importantly, it is easy to see how inaccurate data such as these could drive treatment decisions which are harmful to the patient. Dr. Weisenthal has never warned against using the services of any specific lab. In this case, he strongly advises awaiting the emergence of data from independent investigators, showing that this method is capable of accurately assessing anti-tumor drug activity.
H is for Hawk (57)
10/14 L. hemi-colectomy 3 x 4 x 1 cm tumor, 13/14 lymph nodes pos. pT4a N2B M0 stage 3 MSS
11/14 - 4/15 12x FOLFOX
5/15 PET scan: 2.5 x 1.5 cm l. colon lesion, peri surface lesion SUV 2.4, adenocar., KRAS wd, BRAF V600E mut
6/15 HIPEC
9/15 Pleural lining & liver mets, CA 19-9: 6000
10/15 Vectibix Tafinlar Mekinist
11/15 1500
1/16 200
2/16 100, add Lentinan
3/16 122
6/16 4500
7/16 20,000, CT scan - three new liver mets
8/16 6700, FOLFIRI
9/16 4900, CT scan - two new liver mets
10/16 2255 vinorelbine