The most important issue in having cancer is knowing when to say no to chemotherapy. The five pages below explains why it is prudent to decline chemotherapy for cancer most of the time it is offered.
Erratum added 10 Dec 2019: ” The argument was that 5-year survival for breast cancer had risen from 12% to 18% in 20 years.” Should have been: “from 82% to 88%.”
Unfortunately, chemotherapy is given intensely – even in the last few weeks before the patient dies. In Denmark, prominent doctors have declared publicly that they would abstain from life-prolonging chemotherapy if they got lethal cancer, and few oncologists and nurses are willing to accept the chemo their patients endure for minimal benefit.I wonder why we do not offer patients the same privileges that we enjoy as health professionals. Ending our lives by spending time together with our loved ones would be much better than being pestered by the toxic effects of chemotherapy and frequent hospital admissions, and perhaps even dying in a hospital bed rather than at home.
The pages in the link above constitute Chapter 10 in my book, Gøtzsche PC. Survival in an overmedicated world: look up the evidence yourself. Copenhagen: People’s Press; 2019. Available on Amazon UK and Amazon USA, and elsewhere; exists also in Danish, Dutch, German and Swedish, and will appear in Italian, Korean and Spanish.