October 13, 2015
http://palmbeachhealthbeat.blog.palmbeachpost.com/2015/10/13/boynton-beach-doctor-fighting-cancer-with-stem-cells/
The way modern medicine battles cancer usually occurs after the tumor has been detected. And, the sad truth is, often it is too late.
Dr. Dipnarine Maharaj, a cancer doctor from Boynton Beach, wants to stop the killer disease before it even starts.
Maharaj spoke at the 2015 Palm Beach Anti-Aging Summit last Thursday at Mar-a-Lago, saying the way to stop cancer is to address our immune systems and bank stem cells for future use.
The conference was put on for the third straight year by Dr. Al Sears of West Palm Beach.
Maharaj led off the conference, saying cancer is almost non-existent among 20-year-olds when the immune system is strongest but rears its ugly head as we get older.
The idea is for physicians to address the immune system – which is affected by diet, exercise, amount of sleep and stress – early so that it is able to fight off cancer as we age.
“The solution is not to wait until cancer develops,” said Maharaj, who runs the South Florida Bone Marrow/Stem Cell Transplant Institute.
Maharaj has also come up with an innovative plan to jump-start the immune system with healthy stem cells. He is conducting a study on how white cells from healthy young people can be transplanted into cancer patients. He said the method has worked in rodents in lab studies.
In one of his services, Maharaj offers to harvest stem cells from patients when they are young and keep them in cold storage. He said those in high-risk occupations for cancer, such as firefighters, have taken advantage of the service, which runs about $15,000.
He hopes that price tag goes down eventually so that not only the wealthy can afford to bank their stem cells.
Inside his lab, trillions of stem cells are collected, frozen and stored until a patient needs them to fight disease.
Maharaj also will assess a person’s immune system for $2,500 to see if it’s fighting off disease or falling down on the job and allowing inflammation to develop in the body.
He eschews insurance, which doesn’t value high-cost preventative medicine. And it’s true: the business model of the American health system is based on treating the sick. And no business can thrive without new customers.
So how do we change this paradigm?
Maharaj says patients have to demand insurance companies start covering preventative medicine.
http://palmbeachhealthbeat.blog.palmbeachpost.com/2015/10/13/boynton-beach-doctor-fighting-cancer-with-stem-cells/
The way modern medicine battles cancer usually occurs after the tumor has been detected. And, the sad truth is, often it is too late.
Dr. Dipnarine Maharaj, a cancer doctor from Boynton Beach, wants to stop the killer disease before it even starts.
Maharaj spoke at the 2015 Palm Beach Anti-Aging Summit last Thursday at Mar-a-Lago, saying the way to stop cancer is to address our immune systems and bank stem cells for future use.
The conference was put on for the third straight year by Dr. Al Sears of West Palm Beach.
Maharaj led off the conference, saying cancer is almost non-existent among 20-year-olds when the immune system is strongest but rears its ugly head as we get older.
The idea is for physicians to address the immune system – which is affected by diet, exercise, amount of sleep and stress – early so that it is able to fight off cancer as we age.
“The solution is not to wait until cancer develops,” said Maharaj, who runs the South Florida Bone Marrow/Stem Cell Transplant Institute.
Maharaj has also come up with an innovative plan to jump-start the immune system with healthy stem cells. He is conducting a study on how white cells from healthy young people can be transplanted into cancer patients. He said the method has worked in rodents in lab studies.
In one of his services, Maharaj offers to harvest stem cells from patients when they are young and keep them in cold storage. He said those in high-risk occupations for cancer, such as firefighters, have taken advantage of the service, which runs about $15,000.
He hopes that price tag goes down eventually so that not only the wealthy can afford to bank their stem cells.
Inside his lab, trillions of stem cells are collected, frozen and stored until a patient needs them to fight disease.
Maharaj also will assess a person’s immune system for $2,500 to see if it’s fighting off disease or falling down on the job and allowing inflammation to develop in the body.
He eschews insurance, which doesn’t value high-cost preventative medicine. And it’s true: the business model of the American health system is based on treating the sick. And no business can thrive without new customers.
So how do we change this paradigm?
Maharaj says patients have to demand insurance companies start covering preventative medicine.