Water-Only Fasting Protocols Found to Enhance Cancer Treatments

Water-Only Fasting Protocols Found to Enhance Cancer Treatments

Intermittent fasting has become popular for health and weight loss. But could fasting also be a highly effective tool for fighting and reversing cancer?

Across the world, nearly every culture has a tradition of fasting, but in our modern lives we’ve created a world of surplus and with it a constant and easily satiated hunger. With this excess food, our society has become plagued by diseases of excess.

Dr. Alan Goldhamer is the founder of True North Health Foundation, a therapeutic clinic for water-only fasting that helps patients suffering from a range of illnesses including hypertension, inflammation, autoimmune disorders, and cancer.

“We’ve gone from being criminal quacks to cutting-edge researchers because this idea of fasting has definitely gained some popular support,” Goldhamer said. “Our approach is very different, we believe that there is a cause of real health and the cause of health is healthful living. So, we focus on diet, sleep, (and) exercise, and we use fasting to undo the consequences of dietary excess, essentially. That’s why the conditions that respond the best to fasting are the conditions caused by dietary excess – so, obesity, high blood pressure, cardiovascular disease, Type II diabetes, autoimmune diseases, and certain forms of cancer, including Lymphoma. 

Studies have shown that fasting acts to help the body’s natural ability to destroy dead or diseased cells — a process called autophagy. Now, doctors have begun to study how fasting protocols in conjunction with drugs, such as chemotherapy, can improve the efficacy of cancer treatment.

“It turns out autophagy is the process the body uses to get rid of cellular debris — aging cells and cancer cells — and it turns out that fasting is one of those things that may profoundly enhance autophagy in, not just humans, but also in other animals. In fact in rats, if you do periodic fasting with rats you can double their lifespan (everything else being equal). So, this is something that’s very interesting and promising. I don’t know that we have what I would consider definitive research on the issue, but it certainly raises one of the mechanisms by which fasting may also be effective,” Goldhamer said.

“You know, you get weight loss with fasting — about a pound a day — it’s probably the most efficient way of mobilizing, not just weight, but specifically fat and preferentially visceral fat. So, it turns out fasting is probably the most efficient way shown to date, at preferentially mobilizing visceral fat — the type of fat associated with inflammation and ill health,” Goldhamer said. 

Goldhamer stresses the importance of a holistic and healthy lifestyle approach after seeing positive results from a fasting regimen; a concept that is often absent in mainstream medicine.

“You can get people to live healthfully even if you don’t fast, many of these conditions will begin to improve,” Goldhamer said. “We’ve noticed that recently because we’re booked out for several months and so people can’t come in right away, they’ll work with our doctors through our telemedicine practice; and they’ll work with these doctors, and annoyingly, they’re often getting well before we even get to them! Because health results from healthful living, it’s diet, sleep, exercise — these are the dominant factors that promote health. Fasting is a useful tool as a facilitator to speed that process and, in fairness, sometimes people have done the diet and lifestyle, but they’re still struggling. Therefore fasting can be a very important tool that allows a lot of things to happen more quickly.” 

Goldhamer’s clinic offers free consultations to potential candidates for long-term water fasts and will continue to conduct research into the therapeutic benefits of fasting for treating chronic illness.



Steven Halpern’s Journey Pioneering New Age Music for Healing

Halpern is a GRAMMY® nominated composer, recording artist, and researcher. He is also a founding father of New Age music and a pioneering sound healer. In a rare and inspiring interview, “Stephen Halpern: Healing the World Through Music,” the accomplished musician moves beyond the superficial aspects of music as entertainment and explores how it has the potential to move and transform us at a very deep level. 

Halpern likens his music to “a tuning fork for the brain” that balances the listener’s biofield and tunes their chakras. The result is a reduction of stress, a boosted immune system, and a shift into mindfulness and inner tranquility. 

Within moments of immersing yourself in this otherworldly music, the breath slows “as the music automatically evokes your natural relaxation response and nurtures body, mind, and spirit.” Adding to the basic melody line, Halpern has also infused his music with crystal bowls, bamboo and silver flute, cello, brainwave entrainment, and subliminal affirmations, all for the sake of transcendence.

Halpern’s fascination with music began in childhood with an abiding interest in sounds—the wind blowing through the trees, the steam radiator clicking out its own rhythms, and so forth. One of his first memories was when he first heard music coming from a neighbor’s apartment. He was so taken with the sound that he awoke to his life’s calling. From the earliest age, Halpern recognized the power of sound, both to disrupt health and to uplift it; some sounds made him feel wonderful while others negatively affected his digestion or state of mind. 

Halpern’s next major realization occurred when he left home to attend the University of Buffalo. At that time, as a freshman, he was invited by the faculty and grad students to join a jazz jam session. He picked up his trumpet, began to play, and soon became so lost in the music he noticed his trumpet seemed to be playing itself. “I had tapped into another level of energy,” he said. Like other artists down through history, deeply moved by waves of music, he simply found himself in a state of flow. This opened a whole new world for him. 

Eventually, with an education and experience working in music, Halpern became an accomplished trumpeter. As a 22-year-old grad student, he was invited to audition for a sister organization of Esalen, an institution and retreat that focuses on humanistic alternative education. With a little reprieve before his appointment, Halpern went into the nearby mountains and sat in a grove of redwoods. 

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