Alternative Medicine for Liver Disease

Dear Readers





(This is a temporary reply for a comment a gentleman posted into my Whatsapp chat group. But since it was sent into my smartphone, my reply to him was rather lengthy (below) it could not be fully inserted in Whatsapp on a smart phone which like SMS is actually meant only for short messages.




I therefore take this alternative media to answer his question through this blog instead which may be used for general education on health issues for my other gentle readers as well. Thank you for your understanding).




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Dear Mr.......




This letter (answer) is for you (Mr.....to conceal his identity) . Read carefully. It is also a very useful medical education for the rest in this chat group.





First, I am sorry on your mother’s death due to a liver disease although you did not tell us exactly which disease of the liver?




There are over 100 different types of diseases of the liver such as cystic disease of the liver, fatty disease of the liver, viral A, B, C and autoimmune hepatitis, cirrhosis, alcohol-induced, alpha 1 anti-trypsin deficiency, Alagille syndrome, fatty liver disease, galactosemia, Gilbert’s syndrome, hemochromatosis Gilbert’s syndrome, hemochromatosis, sarcoidosis, liver cancer, lysosomal acid lipase deficiency, Wilson disease, haemochromatosis…etc, etc…down the long list. Which one did your mother suffered for ten long years?





However I suspect it was cirrhosis of the liver from the way you described “my mum has hardened liver” (where the liver becomes fibrotic and harden like a piece of leather). Am I right with my clinical suspicion?




You mentioned she was under a physician’s care for 10 years which makes me suspect cirrhosis, which is probably the only liver disease that takes such a long time to harden (fibrosis).
Cirrhosis itself has so many causes, and I shall mention a few later.




You also mentioned “I remember very well all the 10 years of treatment, no vitamin support was ever prescribed” Be careful of this also. I shall briefly explain later.




You also said you no longer trust conventional medicine, and that alternative medicine and vitamin should also be given to her? Also be careful on this note.




Not all alternative medicine can “care”. Same with conventional (allopathic) medicine.





However if you can give me her medical records on the investigations done, I may be able to tell if alternative medicine and vitamin support should be given that would have changed her prognosis (forecast outcome of a disease).




Ten years of treatment is a very long time. In that period your mother would have a lot, a lot of chances under a knowledgeable doctor who may take an alternative treatment pathway(s).



If that was actually cirrhosis (if my guess is not wrong from the two sentences clue you wrote), then a lot could have been done to brake, alter the course of cirrhosis (if that was the disease) or even reverse its pathology. But I do not know what her doctor did for her?


There are just 3 main causes for cirrhosis of the liver.

Chronic alcoholism


Viral infection, especially hepatitis B, A and C


Prolonged and low dose ingestion of toxic substances



Examples of liver toxins in foods are: aflatoxins or other mycotoxins, and in drugs and medications are (examples): indomethacin, ibuprofen, cimetidine, salicylates, ranitidine, nifedipine, antithyroid drugs…etc, etc…down the long list).




Hypervitaminosis: An excessive intake of vitamin A very much over the recommended daily allowances in foods may also injure the liver.




The liver already stores a lot of fat soluble vitamin A (retinol). Vitamin A in low doses is very protective against most liver diseases, but is toxic in very high doses over many years of intake (hypervitaminosis).




Even synthetic chemical inhalants like cleaning products, benzene, petrol vapours, pesticides, and hair sprays…etc, etc inhaled over long periods and exposures can injure the liver, and probably other organs as well.




Always remember all diseases including liver disorders have a single, butt in most cases multiple root causes.




In the event of early stages of the disease, her doctor should try to identify the root cause(s) as the first step, and then teach her how to remove or avoid the ROOT causes first.




This is the first and most important step in the practice of good and ethical medicine, not just give some medicine for 10 years to block the symptoms.




Once the root cause(s) has been removed through education, then a protective diet has to be instituted to assist the body (liver) to recover on its own.



Fortunately the body especially the liver has a great capacity to rejuvenate on its own.




In fact the liver is the only organ in the body that can regenerate most of it parenchyma (soft tissues and cells) even when almost severely damaged by infections or toxins, unless it is already very severely damaged to its end point over a very long period of exposures, leading to extensive scaring and fibrosis.





It is made worse due to neglect or inappropriate treatment using a lot of drugs that injure it even more. In the first place there is no drug treatment for cirrhosis of the liver.




Hence merely giving drugs for 10 years to manage cirrhosis is completely absurd without removing the root causes, something I have already briefly mentioned as the first line management.





This is to be followed by dietary intervention with appropriate protective nutrition to reverse its cellular chemistry and pathology.




I lot could have been done in that ten years for your mother if these steps were instituted by a knowledgeable doctor who is not blinded only by drug-based approach.




Vaccination against hepatitis B may be the only exception as a prophylaxis, but not for treatment.




A well-balanced, low-fat diet high in fruits and vegetables and rich in antioxidant content especially in vitamin C and broad-spectrum carotenes maybe the best approach in liver-disease prevention, as well as in early stages of the treatment.




But do not overdose with vitamin A, D, E, K and other fat-soluble vitamins as supplements. They just accumulated in the liver, being fat soluble, they cannot get out through the (water soluble) urine, and these causes toxicities in the liver and fat tissues.




Be very careful on this approach when you said in your Whatsapp chat “no vitamin support was ever prescribed” for your mother.




In small regulated doses, vitamin support is a positive yes, but not in toxic high doses especially with vitamins A, D, E and K. The chemistry and pharmacodynamics (mechanism of action) we shall leave out.




Another treatment adjunct is to get rid of excessive body fat as this can infiltrate into the parenchyma (soft cellular tissues) to cause fatty liver, and finally cirrhosis. This is the next step to hepatocellular carcinoma (liver cancer).




I have in the course of my career as a research nutritionist and medical researcher successfully treated about 6 or 7 cases (not very much) using a combination of dietary, natural therapeutics, and herbal medicine, combined with counseling and health education.



I did this completely free-of-charge for the patients who came to seek my help. I prescribed and educate (free), they buy the medication




But whether alternative medicine or vitamin support alone (as you believe in your Whatsapp comment) without integrating this with conventional medical approach that has supportive drugs in critical cases, this is a very risky question to answer.




Since I am using WhATAPP with limited space, it is not feasible for me to describe how I successfully managed to reverse all the 6 – 7 liver cases who sought my help.




There was one an accidental case I saw deep, deep in a village at the fringe of the jungle where there was not even basic medical facilities available. I was the only one there with my nurses and a team of medical lab technologist during our health surveys. The other doctors were stationed at the village Community Centre.




I was there in that district somewhere in Perak with the rest of my medical colleagues to conduct health surveys, and not to treat the community.




His case was so characteristics of an acute liver failure – jaundice, abdominal swelling (ascites), spider naevi, pedal edema (water retention on lower extremities), nausea and vomiting, malaise, loss of appetite, inability to answer questions as the classical clinical features.




It was a straight forward diagnosis based these clinical presentations even without the need for any further imaging, biochemical, or HPE (biopsy) as done in a major hospital.




Where can you get these sophisticated diagnostic facilities when you are working deep, deep into the jungle-villages. You just have to rely entirely on your training and clinical acumen, and nothing else.





Fortunately I happened to be trained also in natural medicine. So I just taught his family to boil some weeds (a medicinal herbs – P. amarus) available just outside his village hut, and give this to him 3 times a day.





That’s all I could do for him inside a jungle without any medical facility. It was a make-shift treatment using the best of my trained knowledge and in medical research.





To even my own surprised, he fully recovered after only a month. By then I was back to my comfortable office at the Institute for Medical Research (IMR) in KL, and forgotten his case.




One morning, a month later, I received a totally unexpected phone call from his son, a Malay gentleman who was working in Petronas.




To my surprise, he told me of his father’s total recovery, and ring me to thank me very profusely for my help.. I did not expect that myself as I have by then forgotten him, but busy analyzing my research data collected in the survey.




I have lots and lots to tell you about these few cases I met, but since I am using a smart phone (that always make a clown out of me with my English, grammar, spelling, omission of words, repetition of the same words, substituting some words or terms with its “smarter” auto-correct), it is not possible for me here to give you a detailed account, except through a few hours talk.




If you let me know specifically what liver disorder your mother succumbed to, and I shall be able to tell you if alternative medicine (as you believe) would have helped.




Please remember alternative medicine is not a miracle system of medicine. The same for conventional medicine.




It all depends on the disease. Many are not curable whichever the medical system. Some are even down right bogus and a cheat. Just be very careful.



I shall tell you later how I was incorporated into a powerful joint technical committee consisting of representatives from WHO-MOH-IMR in the early 1980 -90’s when I was working at the IMR to evaluate all these systems to be integrated into the mainstream health-care system of this country.





Our years of laborious efforts have bore fruits today, with many alternative systems of medicine now officially recognized for lawful practice through an Act of Parliament in this country. They should thank us for our years of meetings after meetings of evaluation.




I have lots and lots to tell you about these few cases I met about liver diseases, but since I am using a smart phone (that always make a clown out of me with my English, grammar, spelling, omission of words, repetition of the same words, substituting some words or terms with its “smarter” auto-correct words).





it is not possible for me here to give you a detailed account, except through a few hours talk.




Maybe I can continue later at another chat session.




Regards and take care on your health



Jb lim