# Doctors:  What is the proof that chemotherapy works?

**URL:** <https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctors-what-is-the-proof-that-chemotherapy-works/663657>\
**Category:** Factual Questions\
**Created:** [July 16, 2013, 12:46pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctors-what-is-the-proof-that-chemotherapy-works/663657 "2013-07-16T12:46:18Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 2

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\
**Post date:** [July 17, 2013, 9:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctors-what-is-the-proof-that-chemotherapy-works/663657/21 "2013-07-17T09:36:26Z")

</div>

I have always believed that the immune system does destroy **most** cancers. It’s just that a few get away.

When I was growing up, childhood leukemia was a death sentence. No one survived. Now, well read about it upthread.

The science-fiction editor John Campbell had some quirky ideas (he published L. Ron Hubbard’s Dianetics and appeared to believe in it. But he once suggested the idea a “licensed quack”. They could use any treatment they liked. The one requirement was that they keep complete records. That still doesn’t rise to the level of double-blind tests, but even anecdotal evidence might be enough to justify one. But the real problem is that they would have every incentive to lie. Too bad.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![Chief\_Pedant](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/a6a055/32.png) [@Chief\_Pedant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chief_Pedant)\
**Post date:** [July 17, 2013, 10:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctors-what-is-the-proof-that-chemotherapy-works/663657/22 "2013-07-17T10:38:26Z")

</div>

> [@Hari\_Seldon](#):
>
> …but even anecdotal evidence might be enough to justify one.

The only difference between “traditional” medicine and “alternative” medicine is an unwillingness on the part of traditional medicine to rely solely on anecdotal approaches.

The most anecdotes can do is trigger a process for a formal investigation. Traditional medicine does not consider some approaches “alternatives” and some approaches “scientific.” Everything that might help gets investigated to some degree; it doesn’t matter if it’s coffee enemas, apricot pits, acupuncture or cyclophosphamide. Obviously some alternative approaches (living in a crystal pyramid, e.g.) get a briefer evaluation than others, but in general every approach is on the table.

The canard that alternative medicine advocates promote is that traditional medicine has a stake in preventing alternative therapies from becoming mainline therapies. That’s just silly. Any physician treating cancer is overwhelmingly anxious to heal, and has an extraordinary incentive to bring to traditional medicine the newest cure.

What is well-recognized in traditional medicine is the limitation of the anecdote, and the need to avoid a _post hoc ergo propter hoc_ fallacy for any given success.

---

<div class="post-metadata">

**Author:** ![SGT42](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/b9e5f3/32.png) [@SGT42](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/SGT42)\
**Post date:** [July 17, 2013, 1:51pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctors-what-is-the-proof-that-chemotherapy-works/663657/23 "2013-07-17T13:51:17Z")

</div>

> [@dauerbach](#):
>
> Well he is right about some things. With the exception of new biologicals, chemo is poison, designed to be more toxic to rapidly dividing cells than normal cells.

Besides cancerous cells, hair cells divide rapidly. This is why people in chemotherapy or radiotherapy loose their hairs.

[Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/doctors-what-is-the-proof-that-chemotherapy-works/663657.md?page=1)