A medical review of the documentary The C Word
The C Word is a 2016 documentary that advocates an integrative approach to the treatment and prevention of cancer by focusing on nutrition, exercise, stress management, and toxin avoidance. Much of the documentary is an hour-and-a-half advertisement for French physician David Servan-Schreiver’s book Anticancer: A New Way of Life, in a film produced, directed, and written by his fiercest advocate, Meghan LaFrance O’Hara.
The C Word weaves interviews, basic animation, and pop culture clips to promote Servan-Schreiver’s theories, enhanced by the velvety narration of Morgan Freeman. While tedious at times, the film maintains an emotional depth by incorporating the personal stories of the subject (Servan-Schreiver) and the author (O’Hara), both of whom battle cancer.
Randomized clinical trials are expensive and mostly funded by the pharmaceutical industry, a point that Servan-Schreiver makes to mitigate reasonable concern about the paucity of hard data supporting his many contentions. Not that this stops him from quoting the findings of less rigorous studies as unequivocal truth. Even still, he promotes an intriguing philosophy, one that falls squarely in the category of couldn’t hurt / might help.
We all have cancer
Servan-Schreiver’s most startling contention is that from a young age, we all have cancer cells, which he loosely defines as cells that have undergone mutations. Any of these cells may progress to clinically expressed cancer decades later. This paradigm shift breaks away from the conventional view that some people develop cancer while others don’t. And if we all have cancer cells in our bodies, cancer prevention becomes essential for everyone.
What he recommends
Promoting an integrative approach to cancer treatment, Servan-Schreiver is not opposed to conventional cancer treatment and also recommends the following:
Proper nutrition. Obesity creates a chronic inflammatory condition favoring cancer. He advocates a plant-based diet, especially those fruits and vegetables with phytochemicals (such as broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, blueberries, and strawberries).
Exercise. Body systems are weakened in a sedentary state while exercise boosts the immune system. He refers to a study that shows a reduction of cancer mortality with moderate exercise (30 minutes, 6 days per week).
Stress management. Stress hormones created by chronic stress states promote cancer. He notes that everyone has stress, so the key is to manage stress effectively. One approach he discusses is 20 minutes of daily meditation.
Toxin avoidance. He discusses obvious toxins like tobacco, less obvious toxins like processed foods (especially sugar), and other toxins most people don’t even think about like those in cosmetics and hair products.
Mutual distrust
This is all good advice and worth contemplating. When Servan-Schreiver’s book first came out over a decade ago (in early 2009), it was met with scorn by many in the medical community who worried that he advanced unproven ideas while discounting effective cancer treatment and thus put the lives of patients at risk. He isn’t doing that at all, at least not in this documentary. We know he supports conventional treatment given that he elected to go through conventional treatment for his brain tumor.
The medical community changes slowly but has come to accept the importance of lifestyle changes in the management of chronic diseases (including cancer). Despite this, Servan-Schreiver accuses doctors of prescribing medication to “mask symptoms instead of preventing their causes.” This is not a zero-sum game; you can and should do both.
Conclusion
The premise of this documentary is that after O’Hara receives a diagnosis of stage 3 breast cancer, she discovers hope once she learns about David Servan-Schreiver. Her impulse is to convince him to let her make a movie about him. I can’t imagine this took much convincing since she remains uncritical and downright fawning throughout.
Nevertheless, Servan-Schreiver has a point of view that will resonate with other cancer sufferers. If you accept the presence of mutated cells in our bodies as equivalent to “we all have cancer,” then this group can be expanded to include us all. I recommend this documentary to anyone who finds this topic interesting, whatever your background or medical history.
Most deadly ironic moment: an overwhelmed Servan-Schreiver appearing stressed 30 minutes before performing his lecture on cancer reduction, where he discusses the critical need to reduce stress.
Best example of hospital lunacy: a cancer patient discusses how the hospital served him a sloppy joe after surgery for colon cancer. I have seen many examples of this, and it never ceases to appall me. The cause may be a miscommunication between services in the hospital, a lack of physician input to the dietary service, or the low priority food is given to health care in the hospital. But seriously, when would a glob of processed meat be a healthy food choice for any patient?
The C Word is available for streaming on Netflix.
About the Author
David Z Hirsch, MD is the pen name of the author of the award-winning novels Didn’t Get Frazzled and Jake, Lucid Dreamer, both available for purchase on Amazon or may be read for free with Kindle Unlimited. Didn’t Get Frazzled is also available on Audible.
He is an internal medicine physician with an active practice in Maryland.
Check out my other reviews:
A medical review of the documentary Cowspiracy
A medical review of the documentary Fed Up
A medical review of the documentary Feel Rich
A medical review of the documentary Forks Over Knives
A medical review of the documentary Heal
A medical review of the documentary In Defense of Food
A medical review of the documentary The Magic Pill
A medical review of the documentary Sugar Coated
A medical review of the documentary Super Size Me
A medical review of the documentary What the Heath
