English-American author and journalist Christopher Hitchens died today from cancer of the esophagus. He was diagnosed with this tumor about 17 months ago.

What did Christopher Hitchens and Steve Jobs have in common?

Both men used DNA to try to discover and treat the gene mutations that were driving their cancers.

Jobs had his DNA analyzed twice, once when his tumor was first discovered in 2004 and again in 2009 after the cancer had come back. Mr. Hitchens had his tumor DNA “decoded” after NIH Director and evangelical christian Dr. Francis Collins suggested that this experimental diagnostic procedure might benefit him. Hitchens treatment was altered as a result.

When they first discovered the tumor in his pancreas in October 2003, his doctors told him an immediate operation was necessary, and could lead to a cure.

As first reported by Peter Elkind in 2008, Jobs decided to think different, declined surgery, and explored alternative medicine treatments for his disease.

Nine months later, in July 2004, the tumor had grown. Only then would he allow his doctors to operate.

Would Steve Jobs be alive today had he consented to surgery when they first discovered his tumor?

Without knowing more details about his case, such as the grade and stage of the tumor, it is hard to say.

However, Dr. Roderich Schwartz, an experienced cancer surgeon has said waiting more than a few weeks to take action on such a rare diagnosis “makes no sense because you don’t know what the potential for growth or spread is.”

Steve Jobs is not the first public figure to seek answers outside conventional medical science.

• Steve McQueen (1930-1980) was probably the first modern celebrity to attract widespread public attention with his efforts to cure asbestos-related cancer through unorthodox treatments in Mexico, where he died.
• Farrah Fawcett (1947-2009) and Bret Hudson (1953- ) sought unconventional treatments for anal and throat cancers, respectively. They even underwent treatment at the same German cancer clinic. Even after her cancer regressed following alternative treatments, Farrah eventually lost her battle with anal cancer on June 24, 2009. Bret however was declared cancer free after completing a conventional chemotherapy and radiation regimen.
• Beastie Boyz’s Adam Yauch (1964- ) developed, and beat, cancer of the salivary gland. He attributes his success to augmenting his treatments of conventional surgery and radiation therapy, with becoming a vegan at the recommendation of Tibetan doctors (augmenting conventional therapy is technically called complementary medicine). Yauch’s introduction to Tibetan medicine came after converting from Judaism to Buddhism.

Steve Jobs, also a Buddhist, was reportedly skeptical about mainstream medicine.

While his uncompromising personality and dedication to unconventional-ism undoubtedly changed the way interact with technology forever, that same stubbornness may have also lead to his demise.

Arthur D. Levinson, Apple’s Director who is a Ph.D. in Biochemistry and a biotechnology executive at Genentech, along with other board members pleaded with Jobs to have the surgery. ”There was genuine concern on the part of several board members that he may not have been doing the best thing for his health,”says an Apple insider.”But Steve is Steve. He can be pretty stubborn.”

“Surgery is the only treatment modality that can result in cure,” Dr. Jeffrey A. Norton, chief of surgical oncology at Stanford, wrote in a 2006 medical journal article about this kind of pancreatic cancer.

While it was Norton, who is one of the foremost experts in the field, ultimately removed the tumor, Jobs decision to seek alternate forms of treatment, such as a special diet, among other alternative treatments could have been what cost him his life.

Dr. Roderich Schwarz (quoted earlier) says he is unaware of any evidence that a special diet can be helpful. “But the patient decides. If they believe an herbal diet can do miracles, they have to make the decision. Every once in a while you have somebody who decides something you wish they wouldn’t.”

Furthermore, to date, there is no evidence that indicates successful “alternative treatments” for Jobs’ form of tumor.

According to Dr. Edzard Ernst, an international authority on alternative medicine and author of the book Trick or Treatment: The Undeniable Facts about Alternative Medicine

 “There are far too many charlatans who manage to convince desperate patients to abandon effective treatments in favour of ineffective alternative treatments. This often hastens or even causes death. In my view, this behavior is outright criminal.”

Could it be that Steve Jobs was so committed to the concept of “think different” that he was unable to “think clearly” until it was too late?

Is it possible that his need to defy convention left him vulnerable to alternative medicine practitioners in need of a major endorsement to validate their “alternative” treatment? Was their success more important than Job’s health at the most critical moment of his treatment?

Buddhist theories of medicine say the reason people get sick is through one of  “three poisons:” greed, anger and ignorance.

That’s like saying the iPad is made from earth, wind, fire and water.

Why would someone as technologically sophisticated as Jobs base life-and-death decisions about his health on ancient philosophy, especially when there have recently been more breakthroughs in cancer research than at any other point in history?

Perhaps Watler Isaacson’s new biographywill shed more light on the medical history of Jobs’ tumor including details of the alternative medicine treatments he pursued.

Until then, we are left with the conclusion that Steve Jobs died just as he lived — thinking differently.

If our headline describes you, you could be a psychopath. Really.

Our title is actually part of a classified newspaper ad that researchers used to recruit potential psychopaths from non-jailed populations. The goal of the research was to study the differences between “successful” and “unsuccessful psychopaths.” Successful psychopaths are people that who would flunk The Psychopath Test, but who have managed to stay out of the criminal justice system.

Researches compared 5 different groups of psychopaths:

1. Pyschopaths living in the community
2. Psychopaths working for temporary employment agencies
3. College students with psychopathic traits
4. Corporate psychopaths in business, politics and other “white collar” jobs
5. Serial killers

The bottom line: Successful psychopaths are smarter and sneakier than unsuccessful ones who are more likely to use violence to achieve their goals.

Both groups are superficially charming, manipulative, self-important liars who are callous, parasitic, prone to boredom and sexually promiscuous.

You can find more information on corporate psychopaths (“Snakes in Suits”) here.

Who are your favorite psychopaths? Most people these days would think of

• Hannibal Lecter (played by Anthony Hopkins) in The Silence of the Lambs
• Dexter played by Michael C. Hall and
• Christian Bale in the movie adaptationof the book American Psycho by Bret Easton Ellis

But there are some lesser-known and more interesting possibilities

• Burt Lancaster (shown seducing Jean Simmons, above) in his title role as Elmer Gantry
• Sissy Spacek in Badlands
• Nicole Kidman in Malice

To prepare for her tole in Malice, Nicole Kidman consulted with Dr. Robert Hare, the Canadian psychologist who invented The Psychopath Test. “How,” Ms. Kidman wondered, “could she show the audience there was something fundamentally wrong with her character?”

Dr. Hare said, “Here’s a scene that you can use. You’re walking down a street and there’s an accident. A car has hit a child in the crosswalk. A crowd of people gather round. You walk up, the child’s lying on the ground and there’s blood running all over the place. You get a little blood on your shoes and you look down and say, ‘Oh shit.’ You look over at the child, kind of interested, but you’re not repelled or horrified. You’re just interested. Then you look at the mother, and you’re really fascinated by the mother, who’s emoting, crying out, doing all these different things. After a few minutes you turn away and go back to your house. You go into the bathroom and practice mimicking the facial expressions of the mother. ”

Hare says, “That’s the psychopath: somebody who doesn’t understand what’s going on emotionally, but understands that something important has happened.”

When it comes to movie psychos, Dr. Hare recommends Sissy Spacek‘s performance as Holly in the Terrence Malick film Badlands. As he says in his book Without Conscience: The Disturbing World of the Psychopaths Among Us , Spacek’s character Holly gives viewers a firsthand experience of that skin-crawling feeling that both lay people and professionals report following their interactions with psychopaths. According to Hare, Holly narrates the film in a monotone, using phrases straight out of teen magazines telling young girls what they should feel. But she does this in a way that makes viewers feel she has no real experience with the emotions she reports, like “knowing the words, but not the music.”

The last film we’ll mention is Elmer Gantry, starring Burt Lancaster, based on the 1926 novel by Nobel Prize-winner Sinclair Lewis. Elmer Gantry is a narcissistic, womanizing, manipulative con man who makes his living as an evangelical minister.

Do you remember Tom Cruise‘s rant against psychiatry on the Today Show with Matt Lauer in 2007? Mr. Cruise, a member of the Church of Scientology, has been so consistently outspoken against psychiatry that the International Association of Scientology awarded him the Freedom Medal of Valor in 2004, in part for “eradicating the very thought of psychiatry.”

During his quest to learn about the impact of madness on society, author Jon Ronson (pictured at microphone) became confused and disoriented while trying to diagnose himself using the standard manual of mental disorders, DSM-IV. So he sought guidance from from organizations dedicated to documenting examples in which psychiatry had become “overzealous” in diagnosing and treating mental illness. Ronson ended up consulting Brian Daniels who works for an international network of Scientologists called the CCHR (Citizens Commission on Human Rights) aimed at documenting psychiatry’s “inhumane and often lethal practices.”

As described in Chapter 2 of his book The Psychopath Test: A Journey Through the Madness IndustryRonson learned about “Tony” (not his real name) whom Scientologist Daniels believed was completely sane but incarcerated against his will in the Broadmoor Criminal Lunatic Asylum. Broadmoor had also housed the real Hannibal Lecter. Tony had been diagnosed with DSPD (Dangerous and Severe Personality Disorder) after flunking the 20 question Psychopath Test, otherwise known as PCL-R or the Hare Checklist after it’s developer, Canadian psychologist Robert D. Hare (pictured at left).

But we’re getting ahead of ourselves here because Ronson doesn’t fully describe the Hare Checklist for another 45 pages in Chapter 3. First we are given a brief history of Dianetics, Scientology and its founder L. Ron Hubbard (or LRH to Scientology insiders) described in Ronson’s flippant narrative style. Chapter 2 ends with the author’s first encounter with Tony who doesn’t at all fit the picture of what most people imagine to be a psychopath but rather more resembles a typical contestant on Donald Trump‘s The Apprentice.

In an apparent attempt to balance his mocking account of Scientology against some of the nuttier theories and practices from the history of psychiatry, Ronson recounts some cases from the 1960s. For example, California psychotherapist Paul Bindrim had patients remove their “tower of clothes” and participate in nude therapy sessions to facilitate “emotional nakedness” using a technique called “crotch eye-balling.” Nude psychotherapy was not restricted to California and Ronson also describes Elliott Barker‘s practice at the Oak Ridge Hospital for the Criminally Insane in Ontario. In the late 1960s, marathon nude therapy sessions, fueled by LSD, were conducted in a “Total Encounter Capsule,” a small room painted bright green.

In our next installment, we’ll cover the development and use of the Hare Psychopath Checklist as describe in Ronson’s book. We’ll also tell you about the differences between “successful” vs. “unsuccessful” psychopaths and some of the influences they’ve had on American business.

Photo Credit: BLISSTREE and Sarah White Therapy

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Bong hits aren’t the only way to get high with the Mexican sage plant Salvia divinorum, you can also chew its fresh leaves as a wad or drink an infusion from freshly crushed leaves.  Salvia means “to heal” and divinorum means “divination” reflecting its traditional uses by Mazatec folk healers or Shamans in Oxaxaca, Mexico. Modern recreational use of the drug mostly relies on “pyrolysis and inhalation,” in other words, a bong hit as recently demonstrated by pop singer Miley Cyrus who turned 18 last month.

Salvia produces hallucinations by binding to a protein in the brain, although not the same one as LSD. The hallucinations are typically described as “separation from the body” or “experiencing another reality.” The hallucinations occur rapidly after ingestion, are intense, and can last up to an hour.

The active ingredient of salvia is a chemical compound called Salvinorin A. Oftentimes, such “natural products” can be modified to produce new kinds of prescription drugs. Salvinorin A is currently being developed as a possible treatment for diarrhea, schizophrenia, Alzheimer’s Disease and mood disorders such as depression.

Over-the-counter preparations of dried salvia leaves can be widely found on the internet and it’s currently legal in most of the U.S. and other countries. If you’d like to participate in clinical research to study the effects of medicinal Salvinorin A in humans (it’s already been given to mice, rats and monkeys), you can sign up here:

In addition to its psychological effects, salvia also produces a number of physiological effects summarized in the diagram below. More information and background reading here.

Did you know? Salvia divinorum is only one of about 1000 species of this plant. Which Salvia species did most of us ingest at Thanksgiving?

The November 17 Oprah Winfrey Show featured a segment on Brazilian faith healer João Teixeira who is popularly known in his country as João de Deus or John of God. The Teixeira story has been covered before, prominently in a controversial ABC Primetime Live segment in 2005.

Teixeira, 68, is a medium with no medical training who periodically enters a trance when he is occupied by “entities” consisting of dead doctors and Catholic saints (including St. Ignatius Loyala, pictured) whose healing powers are channeled through Teixeira allowing him to diagnosis diseases at a glance. The patients do not have to be physically present but can instead be represented by a photograph or patient surrogate.

Following diagnosis, the patients undergo either visible or “invisible” surgery.  The majority of healings don’t involve physical contact: these invisible surgeries consist of meditation in a “healing room” with hundreds of other patients who are instructed to keep their eyes closed and not to cross their arms or their legs. The visible surgeries consist of either corneal (eyeball) “scraping” with a knife,  the insertion of forceps through the nose, or skin incisions on various places of the body.

These procedures are claimed to be effective in treating a wide variety of maladies including AIDS, arthritis, cancer and psychiatric conditions among others. Although Teixeira claims to collect no fees for his services, there are various products for sale (e.g. healing herbs and crystals and DVDs) and “healing journeys” to his Casa De Dom Inacio in the town of Abadiania. The cost is $1000-$3000 depending on length of stay and excluding airfare.

This Resounding Health CaseBook on John of God contains links to all of the background information of our story.

The James Randi Educational Foundation has offered a million dollar prize to anyone who can show evidence of paranormal or supernatural events, including corneal scraping as an effective therapy.

In a story for our syndication partner, MedPageToday, we wrote about a cancer patient who used laughter (and also singing and eating like a pig) as part of his treatment plan. This brings to mind that old saying that “Laughter is the Best Medicine.” Did you know that this concept originated in the Bible, Proverbs 17:22, which says “A cheerful heart is good medicine.”

There is actually medical evidence that humor can have a positive role in cancer and facilitate the interactions between patients and caregivers. One article from a medical journal says:

“The diagnosis of cancer is incredibly stressful, and treatments are arduous. Humor may help to ease the pain, show the human side of the health care team, and help everyone cope. Whether the patient uses humor to lighten the mood of a difficult consultation with their physician, or health care workers use it to help cheer each other through the day, humor and laughter can be valuable tools. Humor can soften the isolation experienced by both patients and staff. When used sensitively, respecting the gravity of the situation, humor can build the connection among the caregiver, patient, and family.”

About a year ago our son and daughter-in-law were honeymooning in Hong Kong. While walking down the street, they passed a pet store where they stumbled upon these doggies in the window, one who was doing what might be called a Cantonese Salsa. They captured the dance on video (below).  We hope it makes you laugh or smile.

According to this week’s People Magazine, country music singer Wynonna Judd, 46, dropped 55 lbs. and five dress sizes using “brain state conditioning.” The magic behind this dramatic weight loss was reported to be 10 to 14, 90-minute sessions at the Brain State Technologies center in Scottsdale, Arizona at $195 per session.

We have written about many celebrity diet and exercise regimens before and we had never heard of “brain state conditioning” before so we decided to look into it using the Resounding Health Baloney Detection Kit and came up with more questions than answers about Brain State Technologies and its founder and CEO, Lee Gerdes.

Mr. Gerdes is described in the People article as a “computer scientist” although we couldn’t find any evidence of formal education and training in this field. According to various web sites, Gerdes’ background and education includes an undergraduate degree in math and physics from Doane College in Crete, Nebraska and a Masters Degree in Divinity from Wartburg Seminary in Dubuque, Iowa. He is the author of a book on new age mental and spiritual healing entitled Limitless You. He has no publications among the 20 million biomedical research articles at the U.S. National Library of Medicine, although he’s mentioned in the July 14, 2009 issue of Oprah online. The mention here quotes Mr. Gerdes about how $1,200 to $4,000 of “balancing your brain” sessions can lead to “effects that can last a lifetime.”

We’ve ordered a copy of Mr. Gerdes’ book and will continue to try and find out exactly what “brain state conditioning” is and how it might relate to weight loss and behavior modification. We’ll report back later. For now, we’ll leave you with one of the principles of Skepticism 101: Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence [to support them]. So far, we haven’t found any.

E! News Now video: Wynonna Judd’s Whacky Diet

During his flight from Rome for a state visit to Great Britain on September 16, Pope Benedict XVI told reporters on board the plane that paedophilia was an “illness” whose sufferers had lost their free will. Psychologists and psychiatrists would agree (about the illness part — free will is a philosophical not a medical concept).

As regular readers of our reports know, psychiatric diseases are diagnosed using criteria from either the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DMS-IV-TR) or the International Classification of Diseases (ICD-10) from the World Health Organization.

Here’s the ICD-10 criteria for diagnosis:

F65 DISORDERS OF SEXUAL PREFERENCE
G1. Recurrent intense sexual urges and fantasies involving unusual objects or activities.
G2. Acts on the urges or is markedly distressed by them.
G3. The preference has been present for at least six months.

(Disorders of sexual preference include: fetishism, exhibitionism, voyeurism, paedophilia, sadomasochism, among others.)

F65.4 Paedophilia
A. The general criteria for F65 Disorders of sexual preference must be met.
B. A persistent or a predominant preference for sexual activity with a prepubescent child or children.
C. The person is at least 16 years old and at least five years older than the child or children in B.

The DSM-IV-TR criteria from the American Psychiatric Association are similar:

A. Over a period of at least 6 months, recurrent, intense sexually arousing fantasies, sexual urges, or behaviors involving sexual activity with a prepubescent child or children (generally age 13 years or younger).
B. The person has acted on these sexual urges, or the sexual urges or fantasies cause marked distress or interpersonal difficulty.
C. The person is at least age 16 years and at least 5 years older than the child or children in Criterion A.

The DSM was firt published in 1951 (DSM-I) and is updated about every 15 years. The current edition, DSM-IV-TR, was published in 1994 and the fifth edition, DSM-5 is due for release in 2012. Members of the mental health profession proposed new or revised diseases and diagnostic criteria for each new edition.

For DSM-5, Dr. Ray Blanchard and colleagues at the University of Toronto has proposed changing the name of the disease from pedophilia (paedophilia) to Pedohebephilic Disorder because of clinical evidence that there are really three types of patient: those that are attracted to prepubescent children younger than 11 (Pedophilic Type), those attracted to children ages 11-14 (Hebephilic Type), or those sexually attracted to both ages.

See here for more information.

Hitch-22, the recently-published memoir of English-American author and journalist Christopher Hitchens, begins with a sad and dark “Prologue with Premonitions” which begins with his description of a magazine article that, due to a proofreading error, refers to him as “the late Christopher Hitchens.” Mr. Hitchens goes on to describe examples of other people in situations that Mark Twain famously referred to as “reports of my death have been greatly exaggerated.”

During an appearance to promote his book on The Daily Show. the man who hates to be called “Chris” told John Stewart that turning 60 years old is different than turning 50 and causes you to “start to look back.” He then recounts the magazine misprint story and describes his initial reaction to it in characteristic Hitchian fashion: “For now, screw you, I’m not late yet.” Still “isn’t it a bit soon? [to write your memoir]“. “Maybe, but there’s no choice of leaving it to too late now, is there?’

Hitchen’s premonitions in his book and on The Daily Show, take on an eerie quality now that he has had to cancel his book tour, saying “I have been advised by my physician that I must undergo a course of chemotherapy on my esophagus,” he said. “This advice seems persuasive to me. I regret having had to cancel so many engagements at such short notice.”

The esophagus is the muscular tube, anatomically located behind your wind pipe or trachea, throw which food and drink passes between the mouth and the stomach. It’s actually your esophagus, and not your heart, when you experience “heart burn” which is caused by stomach acids leaking backward into your esophagus damaging its lining and causing pain.

Cancer of the esophagus is associated with heavy alcohol and tobacco use.  The most common signs of esophageal cancer are painful or difficult swallowing and weight loss. These and other symptoms may be caused by esophageal cancer or by other conditions. A doctor should be consulted if any of the following problems occur:

• Painful or difficult swallowing.
• Weight loss.
• Pain behind the breastbone.
• Hoarseness and cough.
• Indigestion and heartburn

Treatment options and chances for recovery are described in our Resounding Health CaseBook™ on the topic.