Mildred Nelson, pioneer of the Hoxsey Therapy, dead at 79
health...@my-dejanews.com
by Peter Barry Chowka
copyright 1999 by Peter Barry Chowka. All rights reserved.
Mildred Nelson, a leading figure in twentieth century alternative medicine,
died in California on January 28, 1999. The cause of death was cardiac
arrest. She was 79.
Educated (she graduated from the Harris School of Nursing in Fort Worth,
Texas) and trained in the early 1940s as a registered nurse, Nelson was
recognized internationally as a pioneer in the field of herbal or botanical
therapies and cancer. For over fifty years she was associated, and became
synonymous, with the leading herbal cancer treatment of this century, the
Hoxsey Therapy.
In 1946 Nelson joined the staff of the Hoxsey Cancer Clinic in Dallas, Texas
as a nurse, and eventually rose to the position of head nurse. She learned
natural approaches to treating cancer from Harry Hoxsey, a charismatic,
folksy entrepreneur whose family of veterinarians and farmers had over a
century's worth of experience with non-toxic cancer treatments for both
animals and humans. The Dallas clinic and as many as 17 other satellite
Hoxsey clinics were flashpoints of controversy from the 1920s through the
'50s, as orthodox medicine solidified its hold on the healing arts and
actively worked to stamp out viable examples of American folk medicine, of
which the Hoxsey approach was a prominent archetype.
By the early 1960s, despite widespread popular support for Harry Hoxsey and
his herbal treatment, medical-political pressures had resulted in the Hoxsey
Therapy effectively being banished from the United States. Harry Hoxsey
retired from the medical business.
In 1963, Nelson, with Hoxsey's blessing and in possession of his original
herbal formulas, took the radical move of founding the first alternative
medical treatment facility outside the U.S. that was designed to cater to
American citizens. Nelson named the facility, in Tijuana just across the
international border from San Diego, the Bio-Medical Center, and she was its
owner and director until her death. Bio-Medical was devoted to natural
medicine and the use of the Hoxsey Therapy, and many people simply called it
the "Hoxsey Clinic." Despite the challenges that faced a North American woman
establishing a business in a conservative, male-dominated, developing nation
in the early 1960s, Mexico, in Nelson's view, was a comparative haven for
medical freedom of choice because of the more laissez faire political climate
of that country.
The Hoxsey Therapy consists of internal liquid and externally applied
medicines derived from a dozen or so native American plants and herbs,
supplemental vitamins and minerals, dietary modification, and a positive
attitude or "mind body medicine." Nelson’s, and Harry Hoxsey's, clinical use
of these treatments preceded by decades conventional mainstream medicine's
interest in these areas.
Since the 1960s, the Bio-Medical Center with Mildred Nelson at the helm has
treated tens of thousands of people with cancer and other serious conditions
from all over North America and many foreign countries. Over the years Nelson
gained a reputation as a uniquely knowledgable, “hands on” healer, and a
dedicated humanitarian who was always available in person or by phone to
assist and counsel people in need. She took on many late stage cases of
cancer considered hopeless by conventional physicians and developed a loyal
following of diverse patients, friends, and supporters all over the world.
Interestingly, Nelson never advertised or promoted her clinic -- until
recently it maintained a decided "underground" status -- and most of her
patients said they chose the Bio-Medical Center based on the personal
recommendation of a relative or friend who had been treated and helped by
Nelson, or by Harry Hoxsey himself years ago. Stories of people with terminal
cancer who survived or recovered after employing the Hoxsey Therapy achieved
near mythic proportions.
In the 1980s and '90s, with interest in natural medicine growing
exponentially, the Bio-Medical Center and Mildred Nelson, once considered
questionable if not outright fraudulent by the powers that be, finally began
to be accorded greater attention and credibility. An award-winning 1987
documentary film, Hoxsey: How Healing Becomes a Crime, investigated Nelson
and the Hoxsey Therapy and portrayed the story -- and the treatment's results
-- in a very dramatic and mostly favorable light. A Congressionally-mandated
five year long investigation of leading alternative cancer therapies by the
Office of Technology Assessment (OTA) of the U.S. Congress (1985-90) included
positive independent reports about the Hoxsey Therapy, Mildred Nelson, and
the Bio-Medical Center. In the early 1990s, the Bio-Medical Center was on the
short list of promising non-toxic clinical approaches seriously discussed in
meetings by various panels of experts advising the National Institutes of
Health's new Office of Alternative Medicine. In 1996 the University of Texas
at Houston's Center for Alternative Medicine Research in Cancer began a study
of the clinical results of Bio-Medical Center's treatments.
To date, however, despite remarkable anecdotal reports over many decades,
objective, published clinical research studies of the results of the Hoxsey
Therapy at Bio-Medical Center (prospective or retrospective) are rare or
nonexistent. However, an interesting historical and literature review of the
Hoxsey Therapy was done in 1988 by Patricia Spain Ward, PhD, the historian of
the University of Illinois at Chicago, as part of the OTA study (above). In
her paper, Ward writes, "Hoxsey treated external cancers apparently with
considerable success, even in the judgment of his critics. . .More recent
literature leaves no doubt that Hoxsey's formula, however strangely concocted
by modern scientific standards, does indeed contain many plant substances of
marked therapeutic activity. In fact, orthodox scientific research has by now
identified antitumor activity of one sort or another in all but three of
Hoxsey's plants and two of these three are purgatives, one of them (Rhamnus
purshiana) containing the anthraquinone glycoside structure now recognized as
predictive of antitumor properties."
Although in declining health in recent years, Mildred Nelson continued to
spend much of her time at the Bio-Medical Center, overseeing a large staff of
licensed medical doctors and other professionals and meeting with many
patients, right up until the day before she died. Recognizing the important
historical legacy and future potential of the Hoxsey Therapy, Nelson recently
took steps to ensure that her work at the Bio-Medical Center would continue
after her. She appointed her sister, Liz Jonas, who has been working closely
with Nelson at the clinic for several years, as the on-site administrator of
the Bio-Medical Center. Meanwhile, Nelson's staff has pledged to carry her
work forward into the new millennium.
In addition to being a memorable person and a noteworthy clinician, Mildred
Nelson exhibited the talents of a remarkable raconteur, offering a continual
stream of recollections and stories that evoked for her visitors a colorful
and exciting history of pre-technological healing which is quickly becoming
archaic -- a bridge to the past that, in the rush to modern scientism, is
being swept away and will soon be forgotten.
Part of that past, for many people personified by Mildred Nelson, included a
kind of medicine and a commitment to healing characterized by an unfailing
dedication to patients, a radically close attention to patients' clinical
signs and symptoms, and a willingness to be open to using whatever methods
might help a sick person get better, whatever the cost to the practitioner.
For more information,
The Bio-Medical Center
http://members.xoom.com/hoxsey
Hoxsey Summary
Center for Alternative Medicine Research in Cancer, University of Texas at
Houston
http://www.sph.uth.tmc.edu:8052/utcam/summary/hoxsey.htm
Hoxsey Scientific Review
Center for Alternative Medicine Research in Cancer, University of Texas at
Houston
http://www.sph.uth.tmc.edu:8052/utcam/agents/hoxsey.htm
History of Hoxsey Therapy by Patricia Spain Ward, PhD
http://members.xoom.com/hoxsey/ward.html
Chapter 4 Herbal Treatments: Unconventional Cancer Treatments (OTA 1990)
http://www.naturalhealthvillage.com/reports/uct/chap4.htm
END
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Henriette Kress
alt.folklore.herbs:
>Mildred Nelson, pioneer of the Hoxsey Therapy, dead at 79
>by Peter Barry Chowka
>copyright 1999 by Peter Barry Chowka. All rights reserved.
>
>Mildred Nelson, a leading figure in twentieth century alternative medicine,
>died in California on January 28, 1999. The cause of death was cardiac
>arrest. She was 79.
Just a bit of perspective here:
The Hoxsey formula was basically the old Compound Alterative Elixir of
Trifolium, found in most any US Dispensatory or Formulary of the times. Pioneer?
Perhaps. Hoxsey was a shoe salesman, and he found something else to peddle, but
by no means did he -invent- his formula.
The Hoxsey cancer clinics were shut down in the 1930's, more because of the
politics of the time (the allopathics doing all they could to take over from
Eclectics, Physiomedicalists, and other botanical medicine folks) than anything
else.
Henriette
--
he...@saunalahti.fi Helsinki, Finland http://metalab.unc.edu/herbmed
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