Steve Jobs died early due to his belief in "alternative" medicine

I have a problem with the phrase "died early" He died when he was supposed to die. His life and what he did with it was his choice. Thank "dog" we have a choice. My sister had breast cancer she is cancer free, but has told me over and over she would never do chemo again.

It's impossible to know the specifics of his case. The top commenter on that article implies that Jobs' cancer would have been easily removable with surgery; and if that's the case I can't say I personally understand his desire not to undergo the procedure. On the other hand, if Jobs was told that chemo and radiation were an inherently necessary part of treatment, or that his chances of survival after treatment were not as high as that guy says they could have been, then I can see the decision being much more nuanced.

My own uncle chose not to undergo chemo/radiation when he was diagnosed with colon cancer. Not because he was against conventional medicine--he understood that he would die, but having watched his mother go through chemo for the same type of cancer, he simply decided he was not interested in that level of suffering.

Well .... dying is an alternative.

No, dying is not. When is an alternative.

I thought the saying went "Death is the alternative; but, when is an option."

I would never do chemo again.

surgery? hell yes. I love pre-op and post-op meds. :D

Nirvana;763286 wrote:

I have a problem with the phrase "died early"...

I have a problem with the phrase "died suddenly".

[Some comedian]We all die "suddenly". You're alive, you're alive, you're alive, ANDTHENYOU'REDEAD!!![/Some comedian]

I don't blame Jobs for turning to alternative medicine. Mainstream treatments have almost nothing to offer pancreatic cancer sufferers. Here's what one pancreatic cancer site has to say.

Survival Rates
According to the American Cancer Society, for all stages of pancreatic cancer combined, the one-year relative survival rate is 20%, and the five-year rate is 4%. These low survival rates are attributable to the fact that fewer than 20% of patients' tumors are confined to the pancreas at the time of diagnosis; in most cases, the malignancy has already progressed to the point where surgical removal is impossible

Progression
In patients where a cure is not possible, progression of the disease may be accompanied by progressive weakness, weight loss, and pain.

Wikipedia says the same thing, BTW - just with more scientific jargon.

So, if I were old Steve, I'd let modern medicine give it a shot, but if the treatment wasn't working (which it probably wasn't), why not experiment with alternative medicine?

I for one would not want to be kept alive for months, wracked with pain and getting weaker everyday and waiting for my inevitable death.

Yeah, maybe he died a little sooner, but he also had to endure less protracted suffering.

Well, if you read the link in the original post, he supposedly had a special kind of pancreatic cancer that was much more benign and survivable than most pancreatic cancers, but only with treatment that he didn't seek.

I heard Farrah Fawcett refused chemo and did some weird treatment in Germany to treat her rectal cancer. She'd fly over there for it - and the docs over there seemed very encouraging and hopeful. right up until she died.

SamIam;763472 wrote:

I don't blame Jobs for turning to alternative medicine. Mainstream treatments have almost nothing to offer pancreatic cancer sufferers. Here's what one pancreatic cancer site has to say.



Wikipedia says the same thing, BTW - just with more scientific jargon.

So, if I were old Steve, I'd let modern medicine give it a shot, but if the treatment wasn't working (which it probably wasn't), why not experiment with alternative medicine?

I for one would not want to be kept alive for months, wracked with pain and getting weaker everyday and waiting for my inevitable death.

Yeah, maybe he died a little sooner, but he also had to endure less protracted suffering.

Unless I've misread the article, he did the opposite. He went straight for the alternative therapies and only went for mainstream treatment afterwards, by which time it had progresed beyond the easily treated cancer that they were talking about.


There is a real problem with people turning to faith healers and/or unproven (even unprovable in some cases) alternative therapies as a first step.

It's understandable. Cancer and its treatment are scary shit. Mainstream medicine doesn't always work, is often arduous, painful and upsetting, and every one of us most likely has a horror story in mind of a relative or friend who went all through the nightmare to no avail.

All blame in this area should be reserved for the charlatans who offer hope and dangle a cure when in fact they're not providing anything of the sort.

Personally I think the phrase 'alternative medicine' should be taken out of the language, put up against a wall and shot 10 times. 'Unproven medicine' is more accurate. As Tim Minchin says: y'know what they call alternative medicine that's been proven to work? Medicine.

Thanks, Dana. I did indeed skip right over the article and hadn't read it before I made my post. This thread makes much more sense now.

Brianna;763475 wrote:

I heard Farrah Fawcett refused chemo and did some weird treatment in Germany to treat her rectal cancer. She'd fly over there for it - and the docs over there seemed very encouraging and hopeful. right up until she died.

Farrah didn't refuse chemo, she went through it. The treatment in Germany were treatments that weren't approved in the the US. I think these treatments were a last resort for her. Suzanne Somers I believe is one who refused chemo. She also stated that chemo is what killed Patrick Swayze. I don't believe that because I feel every case is different and should be treated as such.

glatt;763474 wrote:

Well, if you read the link in the original post, he supposedly had a special kind of pancreatic cancer that was much more benign and survivable than most pancreatic cancers, but only with treatment that he didn't seek.

It was a choice he made. He was a pretty smart guy. Many people seek to have no treatment. That is also a choice. We have to respect that.

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My friend who had breast cancer also says she would not do chemo again. She is into non-convential medicine, but alongside traditional medicine as complimentary not alternative therapy. Chemo is harsh and many of its side effects are permanently debilitating. Death is also permanent, but when the chemo is "just in case there's metastasis we might have missed" I can see why people who have been through it once, say not again.

I think there's a huge difference between someone choosing not to go through chemotherapy, and someone choosing to go entirely for 'alternative medicine'.

I think there's a place for alternative therapies as a compliment to treatment. If nothing else the placebo effect can be a powerful thing. I see no reason not to try and harness the power of the mind in the quest to get well. The problem is that in many cases 'alternative medicine' is in fact an 'alternative to' medicine.

What I find heartbreaking is the number of people who go straight for the alternative therapies, and then when that doesn't work (which obviously it wouldnt) it's too late for conventional treatments to work.

DanaC;763719 wrote:

I think there's a huge difference between someone choosing not to go through chemotherapy, and someone choosing to go entirely for 'alternative medicine'.

Actually there is no difference. They are both conscious decisions made by the person who is facing death.

I think there's a place for alternative therapies as a compliment to treatment.

It is not a question of "compliment", and as in this case I would completely agree, it was a question of abandon mainstream science for alternative therapy, at least that is what I garnered from the previous discussion.

I meant there's a difference in terms of impact, and vulnerability to exploitation.

DanaC;763719 wrote:

I think there's a place for alternative therapies as a compliment to treatment.

"What a lovely treatment! It really ties the whole procedure together."

Like that kind of compliment? Or did you mean complement?
[/smartass]

Ahahahah. Ahahahahaha.

*burp*

A sappy relative happened to forward this 2005 speech by Steve Jobs in an email to my stepdaughter today.

About a year ago I was diagnosed with cancer. I had a scan at 7:30 in the morning, and it clearly showed a tumor on my pancreas. I didn't even know what a pancreas was. The doctors told me this was almost certainly a type of cancer that is incurable, and that I should expect to live no longer than three to six months. The doctor told me to go home and get my affairs in order, which is doctor's code for prepare to die...

I lived with that diagnosis all day. Later that evening I had a biopsy... I was sedated, but my wife, who was there, told me that when they viewed the cells under a microscope the doctors started crying because it turned out to be a very rare form of pancreatic cancer that is curable with surgery. I had the surgery and I'm fine now.

Obviously he's not fine now, and who knows what treatment options he pursued when the cancer came back 6 years later. But when presented with the opportunity to have it easily cured by surgery, he took it.

Yep - got a video from a relative today as well (weird) It was from a speech he gave at Stanford in 2005.

That's the timeline, he was diagnosed, went with alternative treatment for some unspecified amount of time, and then finally had surgery in 2004.

Found it! Starts at 10:12


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Undertoad wrote:

That's the timeline, he was diagnosed, went with alternative treatment for some unspecified amount of time, and then finally had surgery in 2004.

*shrug* Perhaps so. His decisions, not yours. Someday people may try to say that "Undertoad died early because he ignored the risks of diabetes." You're not Steve Jobs and he's not you. (For which we're all grateful, because from what I've heard, that guy was a ruthless bastard. :))

This goes mainstream on 60 Minutes this Sunday.

http://www.cbsnews.com/stories/2011/10/20/60minutes/main20123269.shtml

"I've asked [Jobs why he didn't get an operation then] and he said, 'I didn't want my body to be opened...I didn't want to be violated in that way,'" Isaacson recalls. So he waited nine months, while his wife and others urged him to do it, before getting the operation, reveals Isaacson. Asked by Kroft how such an intelligent man could make such a seemingly stupid decision, Isaacson replies, "I think that he kind of felt that if you ignore something, if you don't want something to exist, you can have magical thinking...we talked about this a lot," he tells Kroft. "He wanted to talk about it, how he regretted it....I think he felt he should have been operated on sooner."

He was biopsied and had the simpler form that an operation would normally cure. He waited nine months and then had the operation. But by that time, it had spread, and the docs couldn't get it all.

Trouble is, we're not always rational about stuff like this. Says the woman with a cigarette in her hand :p

The problem is that there are people and organisations who take advantage of that irrational instinct. Now, when that is to offer remedies and cures for arthritis, or help to get generally more healthy, or alleviate pain from any number of conditions, then I see no real problem. People suck it and see, and if it doesn't help, they can go down the traditional medical route. No great harm done, and quite possibly some benefit gained.

Advising a cancer sufferer to rid themselves of their tumour with the power of fruit or healing energy alone, is unacceptable. Not urging a cancer sufferer who goes to them for help without considering mainstream treatment first or alongside to seek further advice from their doctor, is unacceptable.

He finally had the surgery and told his employees about it, but played down the seriousness of his condition. Isaacson says he was receiving cancer treatments in secret even though he was telling everyone he was cured.

Wow, how horrible. That speaks a lot to the shame he felt about the whole thing.

Shame? Or maybe he was trying hard not to let the cat out of the bag fearing it would effect investors or profits in a company that was on the upswing of profitability in an otherwise competitive market. In other words he did it for the company and employees. I don't see fault in that.

Interesting point. I assumed he told people he was cured because he didn't want to admit that he had to do chemo/radiation. But you're right, it probably had more to do with the company than anything else.