Sunday, April 25, 2010
Tuesday, April 20, 2010
Monday, April 12, 2010
A Successful Fundraiser and Silent Auction
Friday, March 19, 2010
Malibu Times Article!!!
Local's documentary raises cancer treatment awareness
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| Elizabeth Simonton and Dr. O. Carl Simonton in 2007. |
By Olivia Damavandi/ Assistant Editor
A fundraising event to benefit the documentary will take place March 27 at Charlie's restaurant, and will include entertainment and a silent auction.
“What motivated me to start this documentary was the subject matter, plain and simple,” Simonton, 24, said. “It is my dream to share with the world the story of this magnificent doctor, my dad, Dr. O. Carl Simonton.”
The idea that emotional and psychological counseling in the treatment of cancer plays a large role in how patients will respond to their experience with the disease was a controversial topic first brought to the public's attention in the 1960s by Dr. Simonton, a radiation oncologist who passed away last year.
Dr. Simonton conducted a four-year study in which he treated 159 cancer patients who were told they had no more than 12 months to live. Patients in this study, versus the control group of patients who received no emotional support, lived an average of twice as long. In addition, 22 percent of those living after the study ended showed no evidence of disease.
In 1981 the American Cancer Society placed Dr. Simonton on their “Quack List” otherwise known as the Unproven Methods List. He is the only board-certified radiation oncologist to ever be placed on this list, and the only person who has ever been removed from it.
The main message to be taken away from this study was that there was hope for patients deemed “terminally ill,” and that a patient could participate in their recovery and possibly influence the course of their disease.
“I have always felt that there was something unjust in the fact that more cancer patients were not informed of their own personal potential to heal or of their ability to actively participate in their health,” Simonton said. “I feel it is irresponsible for an oncologist to tell someone that there is ‘nothing more than can be done for them,' when there is so much that can be done.
I started this documentary with no money, no equipment and no experience, but look how far we have come,” she continued. “I have learned that if you have enough courage and enough conviction, the possibility of all of life's pursuits are truly endless.”
Tickets for the fundraiser, which takes place from 10:30 p.m. to 1 a.m., are $20 (cash and checks only) and will be sold at the door at Charlie's restaurant, 22821 PCH, on March 27. More information can be obtained at www. thesimontondocumentary.org.
Monday, March 1, 2010
Documentary Fundraiser!!!
Monday, December 14, 2009
Reel
Why does this film need to be made?
In 1981 the American Cancer Society placed Dr. O. Carl Simonton on their “Quack List” otherwise known as The Unproven Methods List, for his work in addressing the emotions and beliefs of his cancer patients. He was the only board-certified radiation-oncologist to ever be placed on this list, he was also the only person to ever be removed from the list. After 19 years, Dr. Simonton was quietly removed from the list but there was no public apology ever sanctioned for their attempt to derail his entire career.
The advancements in western medicine are indeed impressive and important, but what seems to have been forgotten in the process is the miraculous healing power of our very own body and mind. Dr. Simonton captured this paradox very well in his book Getting Well Again when he says:
“So much time, money and knowledge have gone into our medical technology that it is easy to think of medical science as all-powerful. But when, in spite of everything, people still die, it is illness that seems all-powerful. The glittering machines, the giant laboratories, and the genuine medical accomplishments of our time can cause us to forget that many of the essential ingredients of healing are still mysterious. It is important that we remember the limits of our knowledge” (16).
To say that this topic is important is a gross under-statement, I believe it is vital that the public be informed of the studies that have been conducted over the past decades that have scientifically supported the concept that psychological and emotional counseling has increased the survival rate for cancer patients, as well as improved the quality of life and death for these patients. This film does not seek to disregard modern medical accomplishments but rather, inquires why western medicine has disregarded the numerous studies that have proven the significance of mind-body work. Why is counseling for cancer patients and their families not treated as essential as chemotherapy or radiation? Why are so many families not informed of the science behind this work, while they are dictated to about the science and importance of risky, experimental drug treatments?
The public will not ask for what they do not know exists, this film merely seeks to introduce the public to these concepts in an attempt to create a place for the emotional treatment of cancer in modern oncology.