THE LANCET: Article from 1880 - today. Cancer - eletro meds

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Fri, 11 Aug 2006 10:40:05 -0700 (PDT)

[Rife] Re: Extreme voltage / Article from 1880

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

[THE LANCET] THE GOVERNMENT AND THE MEDICAL PROFESSION. [JAN.10, 1880]

 

 

 

 

THE LANCET. LONDON: SATURDAY, JANUARY 10, 1880. THERAPEUTIC EFFECTS OF

LIGHTNING UPON CANCER.

To the Editor of THE LANCET. SIR,-As I am not aware that the records

of the healing art furnish any case of cancer having yielded to the

influence of lightning, I venture to draw the attention of the

numerous readers of THE LANCET to the following remarkable case, which

may awaken due interest in the curative value of electricity in

diseases of a malignant type. Many years ago I heard the late Dr.

Golding Bird express an opinion to the effect that electrical sparks

drawn from a cancerous structure until an eruption is produced was the

only reliable means of cure which he could endorse. In confirmation of

the theory of the celebrated electrician, I beg to submit an

extraordinary instance of the therapeutic freaks of atmospherical

electricity in the cure of cancer. The case loses none of its interest

on the plea of antiquity.

About thirty years ago, I attended Reuben S,---, a farm labourer,

residing at Langtoft, on the Yorkshire Wolds, who suffered from cancer

of the inferior lip and part of the chin for about a year, and who had

agreed to an operation for their removal. In the meantime he under

took to assist a poor farmer for a day in ploughing his land. During

this Occupation he was struck down by lightning, and carried home in a

state of insensibility. Both of his horses were killed, and the wooden

beam of the plough was split and reduced to considerable fragments.

Soon after the occurrence I visited, and found the ploughman in a

state of great prostration, and emitting a strong odour of ozone,

indicating electrical condensation of the adherent oxygen. As soon as

reaction took place I bled him from the arm, which act constituted the

whole of the treatment. What seems to be the most astonishing feature

in the case is the healing process which was set up in the lip and

chin soon after the

accident. The cancer gradually lessened, and in a few weeks every

trace of the diseased structure disappeared, and for ten years he

enjoyed complete freedom from his former suffering and signs of the

disease.

 

 

 

 

By PHILIP WALZER, The Virginian-Pilot

© March 13, 2006

NORFOLK - A team of scientists from Old Dominion University and

Eastern Virginia Medical School has reported killing melanoma s in

mice using lightning-fast, high-powered jolts of electricity.

The researchers expect their paper to be placed online Wednesday in

the journal Biochemical and Biophysical Research Communications .

It's the culmination of at least eight years of work seeking possible

health benefits from short, high-voltage doses of electricity. The

results, the researchers think , eventually could translate into an

effective cancer treatment that carries no side effects.

" We've never had a tumor that didn't respond, " said the lead

researcher, Richard Nuccitelli , an associate professor of electrical

and computer engineering at Old Dominion. " Every tumor has shrunk. We

know we can eliminate them with the right conditions. "

The electric bursts often disrupted the blood flow to the tumor cells

and shrunk their nuclei by 50 percent, Nuccitelli said.

The scientists found that they could kill the tumors with hundreds of

electrical pulses in two treatments given two to three weeks apart.

Each burst of electricity carried 4,000 volts and lasted less than

one-millionth of a second.

Nuccitelli said they think the process worked by severely damaging the

DNA in the cells.

The method produced no scarring and did not harm adjacent cells, the

professors said. The mice survived, they said, with no ill effects.

James Weaver , a senior research scientist for the Harvard-MIT

Division of Health Sciences and Technology , said Friday that the team

from ODU and EVMS is in the forefront of bioelectric research.

" People have known for a long time that certain kinds of big

electrical field pulses can kill cells, " he said.

This, Weaver said, might mark the first time tumor cells have been

killed without harming nearby cells.

" I think it's going to attract a lot of attention, " he said.

Another researcher on the team, Karl Schoenbach , who holds ODU's

Batten Endowed Chair of Bioelectric Engineering , said they focused

" on the one type of cancer which is the easiest one to access. " H e

said the work might have many more applications.

" It could give a new weapon to cancer research, " Schoenbach said.

" Maybe some tumors that are not responding now might respond

electrically. "

Nuccitelli, who also works for a biotechnology company, BioElectroMed

Corp. , said the corporation might try to adapt the research to treat

human skin lesions.

The scientists said they need to hone their techniques before they can

experiment on people. Doing that, they said, requires a federal grant,

which they have not yet won.

Eight professors and graduate students participated in the study. They

are affiliated with the Frank Reidy Research Center for Bioelectrics ,

a collaborative effort between ODU and EVMS led by Schoenbach.

The center takes up the fifth floor of the Norfolk Public Health

Center , near Brambleton and Colley avenues.

The melanoma work is not the first piece of prominent research to come

out of the bioelectrics center in the past year.

Mounir Laroussi , an associate professor at Old Dominion, developed a

" plasma pencil " that kills E. coli bacteria but leaves skin cells

unharmed. Laroussi has been featured on the Discovery Channel and in

National Geographic.

Nuccitelli said he hopes the paper about melanoma will draw lots of

attention.

" As well as money, of course, " said Stephen Beebe , an associate

professor of physiological sciences at EVMS who helped to pioneer the

bioelectric research.

 

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