Jensen case raises thorny issues

There are medical doctors in Utah who use complementary therapies to treat cancer, but it's not easy to get them to talk on or off the record for fear of reprisals from the medical community. Conventional medicine views many alternative therapies as unproven, not backed up by double-blind studies. Doctors who are willing to try some alternative approaches point out, in turn, that there are no deep-pocket pharmaceutical companies to fund that kind of research.

That's not to say that hospitals don't allow some unconventional approaches. Erin Jordan, whose son Zack died of cancer, said that Primary Children's lets parents supplement their children's diets with herbs like echinacea or use therapies such as guided imagery while they're going through chemotherapy. The only exception is when those complementary approaches might interfere — for example, vitamin B can weaken the effectiveness of one type of chemo.

"I've never met a doctor at Primary Children's that wouldn't work with you to treat your child," said Jordan, who is executive director of Candlelighters for Childhood Cancer, a support group for families who have children with cancer. Jordan took her son off chemotherapy after he relapsed for the third time, had 40 tumors in his body and was given a 10 percent chance for survival.

"Chemotherapy is not a walk in the park, but it's what we have to offer, and our treatments are getting better," she said.

David Hargraves agrees. His son Sebastian was diagnosed with Ewing's sarcoma in 1999 and went through a lengthy course of chemotherapy similar to the 49-week one Primary Children's recommended for Parker Jensen. Sebastian is now in remission.

"At some point I don't understand the Jensens," Hargraves said. "I don't understand how anyone could wait and prolong something that could be getting worse."

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E-mail: jarvik@desnews.com; jdobner@desnews.com