“I should be dead by now,” says 74 year-old Ron Gibson over the phone from his Vancouver, B.C., home.

Since 2004, he’s been struggling with invasive cancers that literally brought him to his knees.

“I had no idea anything was going on,” he says. “But then there was blood in my urine, and at the emergency room I was on my hands and knees crawling up to the desk.”

Even though he started going to the BC Cancer Agency in Vancouver, and was taking chemotherapy tablets by mouth, things were deteriorating quickly.

“The cancer really spread, attacking my lungs,” he says. “It was eating the bone away. If it had cut right through, it would have left me paralyzed.”

He began to wither away, going from a robust 230 pounds to 158 pounds in few months. He wasn’t getting any good news and was starting to question whether traditional treatments were enough. He was also struggling to find a doctor who could offer anything beyond a slim thread of hope. Things were looking grim.

“I was given two years to live and a 20 percent chance of recovery.”

It was Gibson’s son and daughter-in-law that urged him to keep fighting, stay positive and seek integrative therapies. Both UFC competitors, they were getting IV vitamin treatments at Port Moody Health Centre for Integrative Medicine & Cancer Care and suggested he explore its cancer treatments.

Dr. Sharon Gurm has been treating him for two years. “It was an urgent situation,” she says. “One of the tumors was encroaching on an area of the spinal cord and it could paralyze the diaphragm. He wasn’t responding to radiation. We started on a treatment protocol.”

Working together with his oncologist, Dr. Gurm developed an integrative treatment protocol that included chemotherapy in conjunction with Oncothermia (a Health Canada-approved hyperthermia treatment for cancer) and IV therapies.

In addition to local regional hyperthermia, Gibson also received whole-body fever range treatments that elevated his body temperate to fever range. In doing so, they increased his body’s chances to fight the cancer.

“That’s a real test of durability,” he says.

He is also taking Inylata, has eliminated red meat from his diet, eats free range, organic food and follows a low-glycemic diet.

Dr. Gurm says the integrative approach has been highly successful. “We shrank all the tumors. He has very little disease left in his body.”

“There are so many elements to health and healing that need to be looked at as a whole in order to improve a person’s chances of overcoming a disease and living a quality life,” Dr. Gurm says. She also notes team work is crucial.Gibson says the collaborative combination of integrative therapies helped him feel better in a short period of time. “I started to feel more energy.”  

He also notes his family doctor was slow to accept naturopathic treatments, but she now refers her patients to speak with him about his experience.

“I’ve met a lot of people going through similar experiences,” he says.

An avid fisherman and gardener, Gibson just returned from catching a 23-pound salmon at Ambleside. He heads up to Bunsen Lake regularly to fish for trout. He has more vitality than ever and is grateful to have increased mobility. He is also very aware of the importance of good mental health in the healing process. “Most of the fight is mental. If you don’t fight it, you lose.”