Survival of patients with advanced and recurrent ovarian cancer treated using integrative medicine in Malaysia: A case series

BACKGROUND: This case series describes the survival outcomes of patients who underwent integrative medicine (IM) protocol for ovarian cancer, a treatment protocol, that integrated a carefully selected set of complementary and alternative medicine (CAM) into the conventional treatment for ovarian cancers.

MATERIALS AND METHODS: Retrospective review of patients' medical records was conducted at a private medical centre that delivered the IM protocol for patients with advanced and recurrent ovarian cancers. We explored and analysed the overall survival and disease progressions of those who received the IM treatment for at least 2 months.

RESULTS: Forty patients with advanced ovarian cancers fulfilled the inclusion criteria for this case series. An overall of 75% of the cases achieved remission with initial IM treatment, 17.5% had a partial response and 7.5% showed progressive disease. The overall 5-year survival for all 40 cases is 53.1%. When explored further, the 5-year survival for cases who received CAM only is 75%, and cases who received combined limited chemotherapy with CAM had a 5-year survival of 55%. At study endpoint, 11 cases died due to ovarian cancer.

CONCLUSION: These findings suggest that CAM may be a valuable addition to conventional therapy to treat and improve the survival of patients with ovarian cancers. A formal randomized control trial is required to evaluate the efficacy and long-term outcomes of using IM to treat advanced and recurrent ovarian cancers.