“About 30 to 40 percent of tumor patients die from treatment, more than 30 percent die from fright, and only 30 percent die from malignant neoplastic disease!” The professor made astonishing remarks. At the first meeting, the reporter was attracted by his frankness and integrity. According to the professor, in China, there is considerable arbitrariness and irregularity in tumor treatment. A nurse suffering from advanced colon cancer had metastasis in multiple sites and was no longer an indication for surgery, but still underwent colon surgery to remove it. Soon after the operation, the cancer metastasized to the small intestine, and then the small intestine was removed; soon after that, the cancer metastasized to the stomach, and then the stomach was removed. In the end, the nurse suffered a lot and was so skinny that her weight was only a few dozen pounds, and she had to rely on intravenous infusion of total nutrition every day. After the last surgery, she lived for only 3 months. An old man in his 80s suddenly suffered from compound leukemia, and there was no way back. However, the doctor still used chemotherapy despite the old man’s old age and frailty. After three days of chemotherapy, the old man was unable to eat, so he stopped taking the medicine, but it was too late. After hearing the news, an old Chinese doctor said with regret that he could not use the medicine of tigers and wolves to treat such an old and frail old man. In most people’s mind, they think that when they have cancer, only surgery to remove or radiotherapy and chemotherapy can kill the cancer cells and recover – this is also the hope of most patients and their families. In fact, cancer patients have intricate and complicated conditions, and they should have a correct understanding and appreciation of cancer treatment. Which treatment method should be used needs to be determined according to the condition, and it is not as simple as people generally think. If the cancer is in early stage, it can be cured by surgery and chemotherapy or radiotherapy. If it is an advanced stage with cancer metastasis, it is no longer suitable for surgery. If surgery is insisted, it will not only fail to achieve the treatment effect, but also increase the patient’s pain, reduce the quality of survival, waste money, and finally lose both people and money. According to the tumor treatment guidelines of the American Comprehensive Cancer Network, patients with advanced lung cancer or post-surgical lung cancer, chemotherapy cycles should generally not exceed 4 to 6 cycles. However, in China, up to 10 or even 20 cycles of chemotherapy are just as common. According to this treatment guideline in the United States, lung cancer patients who are over 60 years old and have reached stage 3A, i.e., locally advanced stage, should not be treated with radiation therapy because these patients have extremely weak immunity, and if treated with radiation therapy, they will easily develop radiation pneumonia, which will accelerate their death. However, in our country, many hospitals, for the sake of economic benefits, are carrying out radiation therapy to patients over 70 years old or even over 80 years old, which is a highly abnormal phenomenon. This is also an abnormal phenomenon arising from the industrialization of medical care and the marketization of hospitals, which has drawn the attention of the central leadership. Another reason for over-treatment is the misleading medical concept. Doctors treat patients “disease-oriented” instead of “people-oriented”, thus over-emphasizing the elimination of tumors and the killing of cancer cells, blindly believing that the disease is cured when the tumor is gone. The result is that “the tumor is still there, but the money is gone and the person is gone”. If the cancer-causing factors are not removed and the physiology and metabolism of the body are not restored to normal, even if we have the ability to completely eliminate the tumor, the patient’s body is still in the state of “cancer-ready” and it is difficult to escape the fate of cancer regeneration or recurrence in the end. There is another reason for the emergence of over-treatment, that is, patients and their family members, relatives and friends are so eager to cure and save their lives that they use a lot of expensive imported drugs, new drugs and nutritional drugs at all costs, or even rush to the doctor and prescribe drugs indiscriminately, resulting in indiscriminate treatment and over-treatment, which sometimes aggravate the disease. The so-called “over-treatment” means that the intensity of treatment given to patients by doctors exceeds the needs of the disease treatment, which not only causes unnecessary pain and physical and mental harm to patients, but also wastes medical resources and medical expenses. According to the professor, cancer treatment must be based on the cause and mechanism of the disease, and the treatment should be “people-oriented”, with the ultimate goal of maximizing the patient’s life and improving the quality of survival. In order to improve the symptoms and relieve the pain, patients with advanced cancer should be treated with different symptomatic treatments, so that they can “live peacefully” with cancer and achieve the purpose of prolonging life and improving the quality of life. Some people think that it is not very humane to treat patients with advanced cancer in a palliative way, which is to palliate the existence of cancer lesions. In response, Professor He said that defense at this time is the most aggressive offense. If patients are over-treated, it is like adding insult to injury for patients with advanced cancer. The current Western surgical treatment for cancer is surgery, radiotherapy and chemotherapy, known as the “three axes” of cancer treatment, but they are not necessarily suitable for patients with advanced cancer. For example, treatment for advanced cancer patients needs to be especially cautious because a large proportion of advanced cancer patients can usually “survive with cancer”, and if surgery, radiotherapy or chemotherapy are forced at this time, they will worsen their condition. It is often seen that cancer patients die not because of the cancer itself, but because of excessive and aggressive treatment. For example, patients with liver cancer combined with liver ascites and jaundice, still surgery and chemotherapeutic drug interventions often result in the death of the patient due to liver failure. In addition, patients with emphysema lymph node metastasis of lung cancer, lung lobes were removed and then chemotherapy was administered, resulting in more severe respiratory failure; patients with low white blood cells still insisted on high-intensity chemotherapy, resulting in bone marrow failure combined with high fever of infection and death, etc. To let cancer patients “live peacefully” with cancer is a fundamental change in the concept of modern medical treatment of cancer, with the fundamental purpose of improving the clinical benefit rate. Survival with cancer is not only possible, but also realistic. There is a “cancer fighting star” in Shanghai who was found to have lymphoma shortly after graduating from college more than 40 years ago. This cancer metastasizes quickly and has a high mortality rate. From then on, he embarked on the journey of seeking medical treatment for cancer. For more than ten years, he went through a lot of hardships, and his condition was repeated many times. When it was dangerous, he had swollen lymph nodes all over his body, and at one time he had enlarged peritoneum and liver and spleen, which was very dangerous and made him suffer. But he clenched his teeth and persevered, convinced that he would be fine. He was convinced that he would get well. He would definitely get through it and endure the pain for a while and get his life back. After the careful treatment by doctors in Shanghai Cancer Hospital, and the use of Chinese medicine, herbs and prescriptions, he was finally miraculously cured. However, what he didn’t expect was that in 1991, he got the second primary liver cancer again, and the size was so big that it was really a blessing and a curse. He underwent two surgeries in the hospital and endured unbearable pain. After a combination of Chinese and Western medicine, he miraculously pulled through again. Later, when he gave a presentation to cancer patients, he said that besides building up confidence to overcome cancer, there is a close relationship between good or bad mood and treatment effect. If you are sad, overly sad and pessimistic all day long, it will cause imbalance of physical and mental functions, lower your immunity and give cancer cells a chance to take advantage of it. He often eats fine meat, freshwater fish, shrimp, vegetables, fruits and some high-protein foods, and avoids those so-called “hairy” seafood and spicy foods. He also takes only those tonic products that are calm and nourishing, and does not take or dare to take those hot and tonic ones. According to the experience of fighting cancer, “survival with cancer is not a dream”! The professor also suggested some tips to “live peacefully” with cancer: first of all, “confidence first”, sometimes, the patient’s mental state determines the progress of deterioration. It is hard to put life and death aside, but if you are really not afraid of death, if you have confidence in overcoming cancer, if you have a generous heart and a cheerful personality, very often cancer will retreat. On the contrary, if you hear that you are suffering from cancer, you will immediately have a nervous breakdown and be in pain, and the internal environment of your body will become more dysfunctional, which will help cancer cells. Many cancer patients “die of fear”, as mentioned earlier, are these people.