Surgeon Battling Own Cancer Developed New Treatment

NASHVILLE, Tenn., Sept. 21 /PRNewswire/ -- The bump on his left ear looked
innocent enough. At 33 and just two years out of surgical specialty training,
craniofacial and maxillofacial surgeon Dr. Stephen Cantrell was consumed with
teaching and practicing in a busy university hospital. Then came the biopsy
results: the little nuisance was in fact malignant melanoma. Life changed
overnight.

After the first round of surgical procedures, Cantrell enrolled in a clinical
trial testing a cancer vaccine. The melanoma recurred anyway, and more surgery
followed. Interferon was next but to no avail.

A year later the cancer changed into a much more aggressive form and began
shooting new tumors around his neck and chest with alarming speed. Doctors
then advised that his condition would deteriorate rapidly and he probably had
about six weeks left to live. "They told me to find a nice beach somewhere and
enjoy a few sunsets," Cantrell remembered. "I said no. I worked with some
great surgeons, and they were willing to get me on the table the next day
whenever a new metastasis popped up."

The surgeries to fight the new metastases were frequent. "Those were dark
days," he continued. "I was getting my neck or chest sliced open sometimes
every two or three weeks. At one point I had to stick a large needle in my own
neck twice a day to drain the fluid buildup." It still wasn't enough.

In July 2000 he underwent yet another selective neck dissection, but two weeks
later there were new tumors deeper in the neck. "I had access to some of the
most prominent doctors in the field," Cantrell explained, "but there really
wasn't anything else they could offer. At that point, nothing works."
Realizing he was out of treatment options, he knew he would have to step into
the unknown to fight any further.

He went back to the medical literature, searching for any reasonable thing
that was too new to have been fully tested or perhaps had been overlooked.
There was nothing. Finally, he took an educated guess that a combination of
lovastatin and interferon might have a shot at working.

He was criticized sharply by most of his doctors; they urged him to quit
making his own treatment decisions and go with the standard drugs, even though
they held no real potential. Instead Cantrell decided that his only hope was
to do something he would never ask of anyone else: experiment on himself with
a completely untested treatment. "At that point there was nothing to lose," he
explained. "As it stood I was going to be dead very soon, so any potential at
all made it a risk worth taking." He continued keeping careful notes and
became the guinea pig for the new technique.

Not even he was prepared for what happened next. After four weeks of the new
combination, scans showed no remaining evidence of cancer. The radiologist
assumed that the neck metastases had been surgically removed; their
disappearance with a simple drug regimen was unthinkable. "I don't know what
you did," he said, "but you're clean."

That was nine years and two weeks ago, and there has been no evidence of
cancer since. (Cantrell continues to take low maintenance doses of both
medicines.) Others soon began to seek him out and request the same regimen.
Similar results were seen in additional patients battling melanoma and
pancreatic cancer. Patients with mesothelioma and colon cancer have also seen
very beneficial responses.

Ultimately Cantrell decided that the treatment had to be offered on a wider
scale. Leaving his surgical career, he devoted his full-time work to
developing the interferon/lovastatin treatment. "Oncologists are out there
working their hearts out," he said, "but in most cases the best tools they
have just aren't enough. We're still pumping most cancer patients full of
near-lethal toxins, while we search for something better."

For selected patients, he decided he might have something better. He now has
opened NeoPlas Innovation in Nashville to offer the combination "off-label"
treatment on an outpatient basis. Cantrell said, "It's not for everyone. We
screen patients carefully to make sure they're not skipping another treatment
they should be using." He added, "So far the results have been very exciting,
and expansion of the work definitely is warranted." Eventually he hopes to
implement formal clinical trials with the new technique, but he emphasized
that bringing help to individual patients will always be the first priority.

"I give thanks every day for being alive," Cantrell said. "And every time we
can share that with someone else, that's a pretty good day."

Interested patients can learn more about Dr. Cantrell's work by visiting
www.neoplas.org or calling (615) 371-8100.

SOURCE NeoPlas Innovation

Dr. Stephen B. Cantrell, NeoPlas Innovation, +1-615-371-8100,
office@neoplas.org