Talk Cancer

Question:

Can anyone provide feedback on the NONI juice for cancer patients ? I was quite impressed by the presentation of the Morinda brand. It costs Sin$ 70 per bottle. Cancer patient will consume the whole bottle within 4 days, It is very expensive. My wife has discovered the Ovarian cancer 2 months after the delivery of the second baby. She is only in mid 30s. The cancer cell is already spread to the tube. According to the CT scan, Liver may be affected. Both Ovaries and Uterus were removed (May 2000). Now she has just completed 3rd course of Chemotherapy (Taxol & Carbonplotin?). Can NONI juice help ? Or, is there any other better herbs or health food can help beside the standard treatment (operation, Chemotherapy, Radiotherapy,…) ?

Response:

Noni is an ancient folk medicine used by Hawaiian and other Polynesians for stomach disorders and some female complaints, not cancer.  We had a fellow in our group who went to a healing Kahuna who told him that Noni wouldn’t do him any good because he wasn’t Polynesian, he was Chinese.  I have also known a number of folks who have taken Noni and the only thing it did for them was to lighten their pocketbooks. Tom – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Can anyone provide feedback on the NONI juice for cancer patients ? I was quite impressed by the presentation of the Morinda brand. It costs Sin$ 70 per bottle. Cancer patient will consume the whole bottle within 4 days, It is very expensive. My wife has discovered the Ovarian cancer 2 months after the delivery of the second baby. She is only in mid 30s. The cancer cell is already spread to the tube. According to the CT scan, Liver may be affected. Both Ovaries and Uterus were removed (May 2000). Now she has just completed 3rd course of Chemotherapy (Taxol & Carbonplotin?). Can NONI juice help ? Or, is there any other better herbs or health food can help beside the standard treatment (operation, Chemotherapy, Radiotherapy,…) ?

Response:

All this hype about Noni juice seems to be much ado about nothing. I did a Medline search and found 6 papers on Morinda citrifolia (the tree or bush or whatever) that noni fruit juice is made from. I also did searches for proxeronine and xeronine and came up blank. The one paper of interest here[1] found a survival advantage for mice treated with a "polysaccharide-rich substance" (noni-ppt) contained in the noni fruit for Lewis lung peritoneal carcinamatosis (whatever that is) on mice. The survival advantage also occurred when combined with sub-optimal doses of adria, cisplatin, 5-FU and vincristine.  The authors say it might have "important clinical applications of noni-ppt as a supplemental agent in cancer treatment." [There is one report[2] of a man who drank so much noni juice it messed up his low potassium diet. The noni product he was drinking contained similar amounts of potassium as orange and tomato juice. So people on a low-potassium diet should be aware of that.] The homepage for Morinda http://www.morinda.com says that the health benefits of noni have been known for 2000 years. But they never do ever say what those health benefits are. Is it good for my heart? joints? cancer? Does it contain vitamins? minerals? Just what is this stuff supposed to do for me at US$40 for 32 ounces? They never say. They do say it took awhile to figure out how to flavor the strong tasting noni juice so it could be marketed (it must taste pretty bad). They do sell another product line of noni juice that is beefed up with vitamins, CoQ-10, etc. These are marketed as cardiac, energy, etc formulas. That’s not a big deal to me – I can buy stuff like that at my drugstore. All the doctor testimonials say is they have never seen juice made to such high quality standards. That’s very good to hear that Morinda wants to emphasize quality. The altmed industry needs a lot more of that. At least you have some confidence that the noni juice you buy will have some noni juice in it. Seems to me that the health benefits of noni are undefined and maybe even just plain unknown. Heck, even chocolate has more substantiated health benefit claims than noni juice. Lance ***** [1] Hirazumi A. Furusawa E. An immunomodulatory polysaccharide-rich substance from the fruit juice of Morinda citrifolia (noni) with antitumour activity. Phytotherapy Research. 13(5):380-7, 1999 Aug. [2]Mueller BA. Scott MK. Sowinski KM. Prag KA. Noni juice (Morinda citrifolia): hidden potential for hyperkalemia? [see comments]. Am J Kidney Dis 2000 Feb;35(2):330-2 – Hide quoted text — Show quoted text – Can anyone provide feedback on the NONI juice for cancer patients ? I was quite impressed by the presentation of the Morinda brand. It costs Sin$ 70 per bottle. Cancer patient will consume the whole bottle within 4 days, It is very expensive. My wife has discovered the Ovarian cancer 2 months after the delivery of the second baby. She is only in mid 30s. The cancer cell is already spread to the tube. According to the CT scan, Liver may be affected. Both Ovaries and Uterus were removed (May 2000). Now she has just completed 3rd course of Chemotherapy (Taxol & Carbonplotin?). Can NONI juice help ? Or, is there any other better herbs or health food can help beside the standard treatment (operation, Chemotherapy, Radiotherapy,…) ?

Response: