Hi
I am new to this forum and have tried to search among the posts for an answer to this but could not find it.
I am wondering why the 'Gerson Therapy' chose apple and carrot juice as their base for treatment? Would there be any other fruits and vegetable combination that could achieve the same result?
Thanks
will
Doctor Max Gerson, M.D. originally worked on developing an effective treatment to treat and prevent his recurrent headaches. In so doing he discovered that a salt free diet, emphasizing foods/juices high in potassium (K) and low in sodium (Na) worked best. From there the treatment evolved into a dietary/medical/detoxication therapy designed to restore the body's natural inflammatory response to disease. Fundamental to that process and the therapy's success is a healthy liver, which often needs to be restored to produce optimum results. In response to early critics of his cancer therapy, who characterized it as a useless and harmful dietary therapy, Dr. Gerson always maintained that it was much more complex than that and that it would not work without the medical component. In fact, he was one of the few physicians in the country who presented his recovered cancer patients to testify to the therapy's effectiveness before the United States Congress!
After discovering that one of his patients he had been treating for migraine headache was at the same time cured of skin tuberculosis, Dr. Gerson began treating other cases of skin tuberculosis with similar success, and expanded the therapy's use to the treatment of other conditions including the successful treatment of cancer. One of the patients he cured of skin tuberculosis happened to be either the wife or sister of Dr. Albert Schweitzer, M.D., winner of the Nobel Peace Prize, who wrote the very impressive "Foreward" to Dr. Gerson's original hardcover First Edition of,
A Cancer Therapy - Results of Fifty Cases, which was first published in 1958. You may be able to find one for sale on the internet or in a bookstore. However, the latest edition is the Sixth Edition, which is now in paperback, but does not contain Dr. Schweitzer's "Foreward". It is, however, updated with information from the Gerson Institute where it is readily available:
https://gerson.com/store/index.php?main_page=index&cPath=1
Right now it is also available at a reduced price in their "Damaged Cover Sale":
https://gerson.com/store/index.php?main_page=product_info&cPath=1&products_id=537
Carrot juice and apple juice are a significant part of the therapy, but they are far from the whole story. As Arrowwind09 has pointed out, green juice is also used. However, fundamental to the therapy are also liver juice, potassium supplements, iodine suplementation (Lugol's solution), coffeee enemas, and of equal importance, pancreatic enzymes, and a diet which also emphasizes high potassium, low sodium, and other minerals, including magnesium, etc., and of course no additives or preservatives, etc.
Carrots and apples are used in part because they are both high in postassium and low in sodium. However, that's not the only reason. They also are a readily available repository of fresh enzymes which can be released through pressing and grinding (as opposed to the use of a centrifugal juicer which does not produce the desired result due to the electrostatic charge imparted to the minerals via that type of juicer's extraction method) several times a day to ensure the freshness and activity of the enzymes. In answering a patient's question about the necessity to use the press and grind technique, Dr. Gerson also provides another reason why apples and carrots are used, wherein he states:
"the malic acid (contained in the apples) mixed with the ground carrots helps to release the minerals from the carrots."
See the second paragraph of the Answer:
https://gerson.org/FAQ/faq.php?faq=26
Also at this Link scroll down to the sections entitled, "Juicers" and "The Diet":
https://gerson.org/GersonTherapy/gersontherapy.htm
Following are other useful Links:
https://gerson.org/GersonTherapy/mg.htm
https://gerson.org/faq.htm
https://gerson.org/GersonTherapy/case_studies.htm
https://gerson.org/about/howto.htm
https://gerson.org/GersonTherapy/gerson_resources.htm
Telephone information is also available from the Gerson Institute, which was founded by his daughter, Charlotte Gerson, in 1977, and which continues to provide information and support for those seeking help with or information about the Gerson Therapy, and which also provides training for interested physicians, treatment centers, and home care assistants. The following excerpts from Charlotte Gerson's "Preface" to the Sixth Edition of
A Cancer Therapy - Results of 50 Cases further explains the Gerson Institute's work and some of the difficulties Dr. Max Gerson, a German and thus a foreign physician from a country deemed to have been a horrific enemy, faced with the medical establishment as well as the prevailing political climate at that time in the United States when he brought his Cancer Therapy from his native Germany to the U.S. in the post World War II years when anti-German sentiment was understandably rampant:
"Max Gerson, M.D. had the wisdom, foresight, and courage to look beyond the prevailing medical views of his day. Out of 30 years of clinical experimentation, he arrived at some then-radical concepts:
Diet has a considerable effect on almost all diseases
The human body can heal itself given the appropriate nutrients
Any effective treatment for degenerative disease must treat the whole person
People with serious illnesses must help their body detoxify
While these ideas sound sensible today, they were almost blasphemous in the 1940s and 1950s.
More than 40 years have passed since Max Gerson, M.D. died in March of 1959. At that time, most cancers were not considered curable by orthodox medicine, and the American Medical Association and American Cancer Society both flatly rejected the notion that diet alone could have any effect on either the prevention or treatment of cancer.
In spite of the fierce resistance to his ideas and methods, Max Gerson worked virtually alone to treat and heal many cancers considered to be terminal, as well as numerous other diseases. He worked to publish and share information as best he could about the methods he had developed. ...
For over 20 years, the Gerson Institute has worked to help patients recover from these otherwise "incurable" diseases, and to share knowledge of, and continue research and development of the safe, effective Gerson Therapy approach to healing cancer and other degenerative diseases. When we started in 1977, almost no one would listen to what we had to say. We were unable to treat patients in the United States because medical boards threatened the licenses of physicians who deviated from conventional treatment methods. Only the desperately ill and dying, "given up" by their doctors, sought our help. In spite of the difficulties, we succeeded in helping hundreds of patients recover from otherwise terminal diseases, teaching thousands more to take steps to improve health and prevent the development of disease.
Today, fortunately much has changed. ...The National Institutes of Health has established an Office of Alternative Medicine, dedicated to research and validation of holistic methods of treatment. Independent medical researchers have documented and verified the biochemical basis for many important elements of the Gerson Therapy in more than 300 articles in the peer-reviewed medical literature.
All of these factors have led to a dramatic increase in interest in Gerson Therapy treatment. Today, our staff handles as many as 300 inquiries a day from those seeking information on Gerson Therapy medical education programs, referrals to practitioners, treatment centers, halfway houses, and therapy assistants. Patients are seeking Gerson treatment as a first choice, rather than a last hope. For those interested in medical training, the Gerson Institute maintains certification programs for physicians, treatment centers, and home care assistants. We are actively working to establish certified treatment centers and medical practitioners worldwide. Contact us for current offerings."
Again, telephone information is available at this Link:
https://gerson.org/Programs/support_services.htm
When Dr. Max Gerson, M.D. died in 1959, Dr. Albert Schweitzer, M.D. eulogized him as follows:
"I see in him one of the most eminent geniuses in the history of medicine. Many of his basic ideas have been adopted without having his name connected with them. Yet, he has achieved more than seemed possible under adverse conditions. He leaves a legacy which commands attention and which will assure him his due place. Those whom he has cured will now attest to the truth of his ideas."
That impressive testimony alone, from a winner of the Nobel Peace Prize no less, should make the late, great Dr. Max Gerson's book,
A Cancer Therapy - Results of Fifty Cases, required reading for medical students everywhere!
