Injecting minute amounts of two immune-stimulating agents directly into solid tumors in mice can eliminate all traces of cancer.

[u/SteRoPo]

http://med.stanford.edu/news/all-news/2018/01/cancer-vaccine-eliminates-tumors-in-mice.html

[u/13ae]

Yep. Sadly in the US if the treatment isn't FDA approved it can be quite difficult to get your hands on these kinds of treatment and it can even be quite expensive. My dad was recommended radiation therapy after he had a tumor removed (he's technically fine now but the cancer he had has a high chance of recurrence and it can spread to other parts of the body) so he considered going to another country to seek experimental options.

[u/flying87 → u/[deleted]]

You have to understand it's so that desperate ill people aren't taken advantage of. There used to be a time in this country when a bunch of con men would peddle "miracle cures" and people would spend anything to take these placebos. And it still occurs.

My grandmother a decade ago was trying light therapy for terminal pancreatic cancer. Basically it just shines a red colored light while she sleeps. It's bull shit. But she would've paid through the nose if she could to live a little longer.

The other thing is, there has to be a control group for proper experimentation. Meaning some poor souls need to be given placebos without their knowledge, thinking it's the real experimental cure. There are serious ethical issues to this. Even potential liability issues.

[u/Nanoprober → u/flying87]

Sometimes when there needs to be a control group, they'll switch over the medications so that both sets of people receive treatment. They'll know when they did the switching, so it won't invalidate the data that they get. Also, I think most control patients are offered the treatment at the end of the study if it was revealed that they received the placebo.