Summary & Viewpoint

Here are some of the points of significance to us.

1. Dr. Michelakis and his team at the University of Alberta happened upon a remarkable new method of treating cancer by reactivating cancer cell mitochondria using sodium dichloroacetate, which causes cancer cell suicide.

2. The results were amazingly fast. Tumor shrinkage of 70% occurred within three weeks of the treatment. (Note that tumor shrinkage that rapid is not being reported in humans. Often we are seeing a 'normalization' of the cancer cells, in which they do not die but behave like normal cells. And not all human cancers seem to be responding to DCA, notably sarcomas. Many other tumor types are showing excellent responses in both animals and humans.)

3. The rats showed no side effects.

4. DCA was administered in drinking water. The rats just drank water containing the DCA.

5. My calculations of the dosage the rats consumed was in the range of 8 to 16 mg/kg, The Michelakis patent states a dosage of between 10mg/kg and 100 mg/kg.

6. DCA has been used in numerous clinical situations, including Phase III trials. The U of A can skip Phase I trials because the clinical safety of DCA has already been established.

7. DCA has been used for many years as a treatment for some human metabolic conditions, most often at 25 mg/kg. DCA has the potential to cause some side effects. The most commonly stated side effect was nerve neuropathy, which is considered reversible, if it does occur.

8. DCA is one of the by-products of the chlorination of municipal drinking water. Consequently, much research has been done on the safety and toxicity of DCA. "No Observed Effect Levels" are established and published.

9. The University of Alberta has held this discovery secret for more that a year. If you look at the patent page, you will see they originally filed for the use patent in 2005. That filing is not available to the public. They had one year to file for the International use patent, which is publicly available. And they did just that, filing on the same date, one year later, in 2006. (This observation provided to The DCA Site by David Springer.)

OUR VIEWPOINT

DCA is potentially the best new approach to cancer treatment in years. The Michelakis team shrank human cancer tumors in rats by 75% in just three weeks using a chemical that is already considered safe enough to use in the treatment of serious and fatal metabolic diseases.

DCA is cheap, costing about $1 to $2 a day (at a 10mg/kg dose). You would add some to your water and just drink it. And for pets, DCA therapy can cost just pennies a day.

However, DCA is not patentable. No large company is going to fund clinical trials and pay the $100 million plus dollars to bring this to market. The University of Alberta is working hard to get clinical trials started. However DCA is still years away from FDA approval, if that ever happens. It is our hope that the information the supporters of this site can gather might help make DCA an accepted treatment choice for cancer.

IS DCA WORTH TRYING?

Talk with your doctor to see if this is an appropriate treatment for you. DCA is brand new and has not been used in human studies of cancer. It is chemotherapy and although practically non-toxic compared to any standard accepted cancer treatments, we strongly encourage you to not self-medicate and to work with a physician. DCA use must be considered experimental.

The risks of a DCA-based therapy are trivial compared to those of accepted cancer therapy. Radiation, chemotherapy and surgery all have major side effects. DCA may give the safest alternative to cutting, burning or poisoning our bodies.

Over 1500 people die every day from cancer in the United States alone. Millions die around the globe, and most of the people of the world cannot access or afford modern cancer therapy.

We were asked to pull our link to the University of Alberta DCA clinical trial donations website at the request of the legal counsel of the University of Alberta on March 22, 2007. If you want to help fund DCA research, please see our links at the bottom of this page.

The fierce debate rages on over whether society should strictly follow a "proper" procedure (one that could take years) to approve DCA or allow terminal cancer patients to choose an alternative treatment, such as DCA, with the possibility of extending their lives. Will allowing terminal cancer patients to take DCA interfere with clinical trials? Should terminal cancer patients have the right to try to save their own lives?

When theDCAsite.com was started, there were no plans nor funding for DCA research and clinical trials and the general consensus was that DCA research and production would be abandoned. TheDCAsite.com was formed as an outreach to help cancer patients get information and share their stories. TheDCAsite.com supports a patient's right to live, to weigh their own options and the right to have access to their chosen treatment.

If you have questions not answered here, email us. and let us know.

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