My vet sent me some letters and discussions about essiac capsules from your website. She diagnosed my cat Valley (short for "Valentine") with feline lieukemia about three weeks ago and has since been working to help us bring him out of his downward spiral.

I have been treating Valley with other medications since the diagnosis and hope to start using essiac. He doesn't eat much, and that use to be his favorite pastime aside from getting on the kitchen counter. He also has little energy for much of anything.

A health food store 75 miles from here sent me a bottle of Flor-Essence with literature about Dr. Brusch and Elaine Alexander, and one cup of Flor-Essence powder to make our own. There is a Nature's Sunshine distributor 12 miles from here and I'm not totally against using the expensive capsules, but I'll start with what I already have.

Since you say essiac tea doesn't keep for long, I don't want to mix up the whole cup for five gallons according to directions for the powder. How do you make small quantities?

Also, how much do I give my little seven pounder who should weigh 11 pounds? He's pretty disgusted with having juices shot in his mouth with a syringe, but he refuses the food when "things" are added. He doesn't eat much even when the food is unadulterated. I could use some advice quickly, thank you for having this website.

Barrie

Jan replies...

I would make a pint at a time for your cat. If the product's herb mixture appears to be composed of "powdered" herbs (finely ground with no pea-size chunks), use any one of these equivalents to make tea with a pint of water:

1/40th of the cup of herbs
1/10th of a quarter cup
1/5 of a Tablespoon (a quarter cup has about 2 Tablespoons of herbs)
2/3 of a teaspoon (there are 3 teaspoons in a Tablespoon).

Most commercial essiac dry mixes are powdered with no herbs "cut". Because I buy the essiac herbs individually (up to a whole pound of each herb which most pet owners will not want or should do), the herbs in my hand-mixed blend are not all powdered (some are cut so they make much more bulk) so I use 2 tablespoons herbs per pint.

I would use the same dose used for Bear and Snowflake, described in letters on my site. The owners gave around an ounce a day, a huge dose compared to traditional usage. These are the two animals, however, who did the best and both are cats. You should gradually work up to the ounce-per-day dose. Start with a teaspoon a day and work up to more over a week or so. I feel if appetite improvement is the only thing it does, that is a great deal.

Just as with humans, some animals don't mind the taste of essiac and others hate it. How you give it (by syringe or mixed with food or water) depends on your pet and might end up being a creative challenge.

Jan

Maggie, my 2.5 year-old yellow Lab, was diagnosed with mast cell tumors about 9 months ago. They are confined to her back, lower leg. She has had 6 operations to remove the tumors as they appeared. After the last operation 5 months ago) the vets all recomended amputation or she would not live beyond 3-5 months.

Well, she is still hanging in there and the tumors have slowed, though she does have another one that is getting bigger. We have had some sucess with switching her to a better diet (initially Azmira Dry) and now raw food (frozen beef and veggies). We have been giving her Grape Seed extract, Pau D'Arco and Yucca, which all helped in the beginning. Some of the tumors shrank and disappeared at first, but not lately. 2 weeks ago we started giving her Flax Seed oil and cottage cheese. No positive results yet. Is there anything else we can give her to try before resorting to surgery?

Many thanks,
Mark

Jan replies...

I have an old Dane girl with mast cell but it sounds like it is not as severe as what you are dealing with. I don't give her essiac because she is allergic to it. I have been seeing the subject of mast cell come up more and more on email lists. I wonder if there is a plague of allergies caused by various things (like over-vaccinating and lousy dog food) causing the incidence of more mast cell reporting.

Maggie probably has serious allergies. If you can get them under control that might dramatically extend her life. If she was mine I would fast her for a day, maybe even two, and then give her one thing for a few days. Maybe beef, since she is eating that now. Add other things one at a time, including those herbs. When she reacts badly to something, give her plenty of recovery time before you try the next thing. Greta was violently allergic to some things and only somewhat allergic to others. Those are the really insidious ones because they are very hard to identify.

It is really hard to find out what they are allergic to. It is worth it though, for this cancer. If food allergy tests are possible that might be an option for you.

Mast cell could be clumps of histamines gone malignant, www.vetinfo.com has a search capability and a discussion of mast cell by the vet who runs the page. I like this page a lot and he is a conventional vet. He recommends prednisone early and also recommends Benedryl and Cimetidine (tagamet). Benedryl controls the histamines and Cimetidine alleviates the stomach problems caused by histamines. Greta got Benedryl and Cimetidine twice a day.

Prednisone is only for emergencies, but it is miraculous how it will pull her back from a really severe allergic reaction. It is used as a mild chemotherapy for several cancers. However, it has significant side effects. If you end up giving it, I would give milk thistle with it (if Maggie can take that). Milk thistle buffers the liver. Unfortunately, prednisone is also hard on the kidneys. It can cause personality changes and weight gain. It is likely to cause incontinence, which is something older spayed females are likely to have anyway. Greta took 1 mg of DES once a week and it controled that. If I forgot, she wet the bed on the 9th day. Prednisone is anathema to holistic vets.

Does Maggie sweat? Greta slept with me and under a blanket, so I could tell. She sweated when she was not doing well. If Maggie does that there is a Chinese herbal blend made by Health Concerns called Coptis Purge Fire. I believe this medicine kept Greta alive while she was eating food that caused an allergic reaction. It is hard to get, the company doesn't like to just let people buy it without a "prescription", so you need to contact a Doctor of Oriental Medicine for information. Some of them actually mix up meds for dogs, but it is likely to be quite expensive.

altvetmed.com/ahvmadir.html has a list of holistic vets by location. I would try to find one before you do any more surgery. You will eventually run out of skin. A good holistic vet is really a lot of help with this, it is much better to have some educated guidance.

Greta and I lived with this for about 2 1/2 years. She lived long enough to become an old Dane in spite of it all. None of the vets (two holistic and my regular vet) who saw Greta made a big issue about finding out what she was allergic to, maybe they just don't know or feel it was irrelevant. Please look into the allergy issue.

Jan

I have been in here pouring over the internet, and particularly your site for hours concerning information on the safety of administering essiac to a horse. I am very leery of this due to the large number of plants that are toxic to them. I found one post on your old message board saying that the woman had given some to a horse without any ill affects. I am wondering if you could give me any more information?

Also, approximately how much essiac would one give a horse? I have also read that one possible side effect is upset stomach. I am concerned that this may induce a bout of colic in my mare. I will be speaking to my Vet directly about all of these things (which she will probably not be able to answer) but am on the "Great Search" for answers now. We believe my mare has Lymphosarcoma, although it has not yet been confirmed from a biopsy. I would much rather be prepared and have a plan in reserve when we get the news...one way or the other. I don't want to waste a minute. Thank you in advance for any information you provide. I have thoroughly enjoyed my visit to your site!

Karen

Jan replies...

This is a new one for me, I know nothing at all about horses! Have you looked on the altvetmed.com site for a holistic vet near you? They might be able to put you on to one who works with horses. Perhaps a reader who knows something about using essiac with horses will write in and tell us!

If you decide to try it, I would start with a small dose and work up to see if she can tolerate it. You ought to work up from there, based on her weight. You can make it twice as strong (so you don't have to give as much) by brewing the tea with half the amount of distilled water the instructions say to use. You are going to need a lot of essiac for a horse (a 130 pound dog takes the human dose), your best bet would be to buy 2-3 pounds of the dry essiac mix at a reasonable price, such as "Blessed Herbs" sells.

My cat is 15 months old and always seemed healthy. Yesterday I noticed her breathing heavily and took her to the vet, who removed 200 ccs of fluid from her lungs and said she has feline leukemia and lymphoma. I have my cat at home now, but the vet said her lungs will fill up again in 2 to 3 days and at that time she should be put to sleep. Would essiac, prednisone or both be helpful? She is 7 pounds, how much should I give her?

Jan replies...

I am very sorry about your cat. Essiac might be helpful, although it sounds like she has hidden her illness very well. It might help her at least feel better so she can live a little longer. I would give her an ounce a day, divided in two doses. You probably will need to work up to it, start with a teaspoon twice a day. An ounce is a tablespoon twice a day. That is a very large dose for a cat but it won't hurt her.

I don't know about prednisone, it has significant side effects but it might be worth trying. If your vet recommends it I would consider it. I think you can do both. I know of one case with a dog who was significantly improved for a little while with prednisone (she had lymphoma). It was temporary but the dog felt much better for awhile. Good luck,

I have a question regarding my cat. She has a tumor on her eyelid, recently it has been growing. I just found out about essiac last week and bought a bottle of Essiac Tonic, which is a concentrate. Mow am wondering if it should be given to a cat because of the alcohol level, the label says something about 40% grain alcohol. Do you suppose it could damage her, or make things worse (bladder/kidney)? I give her 11 drops 2 x daily. The bottle says 40 drops 2 x daily for humans. She is about 11 lbs.

Jamie

Jan replies...

I wouldn't use essiac extract because it is made by soaking raw essiac herbs in alcohol with no brewing process and I think properties of slippery elm are lost in extracts too.

If you used the dry essiac herbs or brewed tea, you would have more options. You could put it on the tumor as a poultice, since it is an external tumor you can see (if she would tolerate that). When essiac tea is brewed, straining removes the herb sediment which can be saved for use as poultices. You could also heat some of the dry herb blend in a good oil at a fairly low temp (200 degrees or so) and put that on the tumor. The oil will keep longer than the tea. However, I wouldn't put any alcohol-based product like an essiac extract or tincture that close to her eye.

My 8 year old Rottie has Osteoscracoma and I cannot get him to eat anything since his first chemo treatment 2 and 1/2 weeks ago. He had his front leg removed and was ok with that, but he's eaten maybe 1 - 2 cups of food total since the chemo. What can I feed him? I have tried dogfood, chicken, steak and lots of other things. Suggestions?

Shaye

Jan replies...

First of all, I would give him essiac and lots of it. Start with an ounce twice a day and work up to two ounces twice a day. Chemo is nasty, and essiac often helps with the side effects of it. He may regain his appetite, but it could take a little while.

I don't think it is an issue of what kind of food. But in case he can be tempted, I had a dog torsion recently, and he wouldn't eat anything for me after the surgery no matter how tempting. He finally caved in when I offered him a concoction called "Satin Balls" and he still gets one every day.

Satin Balls for Large Dogs

10 lbs cheap hamburger (for high fat %)
1 large box Total cereal
1 large box uncooked oatmeal
10 raw eggs
1 15 oz jar wheat germ
10 packages Knox unflavored gelatin
1 and 1/4 cup vegetable oil
1 and 1/4 cup unsulphered molasses
Pinch of salt

Mix all ingredients thoroughly and shape into serving-size meatballs or patties. I make 1/3 lb patties because they are easier to freeze and store. The recipe makes about 50. This stuff turns out to be a lot more appealing than it sounds, it even looks good to me (but I haven't tried them).

I break the eggs into a separate dish one at a time so I can see that the egg is all right before I put it in the huge pot of stuff. I had a bad egg recently, fortunately I happened to break it into a separate bowl instead of the dish I was cooking, so I didn't have to toss the whole thing out because of one bad egg.

The Satin Ball recipe is too big (making maybe 600 little balls?) for a small dog like a dachshund, one way of cutting the recipe down is to divide the ingredients by 10.

Satin Balls for Little Dogs

1 lb cheap hamburger (for high fat %)
1/10 large box Total cereal
1/10 large box uncooked oatmeal
1 raw egg
1/10 of a 15 oz jar wheat germ
1 packages Knox unflavored gelatin
2 Tablespoons vegetable oil
2 Tablespoons unsulphered molasses
Pinch of salt

Good luck, I hope you can get him to eat,

Jan