Pam Winningham

“Eat, drink and be merry – get your life in order. You have six weeks to six months to live.”

That’s what a Univ. of California, San Francisco Medical Center neuro-oncology resident told Pamela Winningham in April of 1988. She had been diagnosed with an astrocytoma brain tumor and had already undergone unsuccessful surgery and radiation therapy. She had declined to try massive chemotherapy because her doctors said the chances that it would help were very slim and she knew it would cause miserable side effects.

Pam was a 35-year-old school psychologist in San Francisco when, in 1987, she began to experience double vision. She didn’t connect this to the mild facial palsy that she had 13 years before, when she was a graduate student, which had left her with a slightly crooked smile. Her opthalmologist referred her to a neurologist, who immediately ordered an MRI scan of her head. The neurologist diagnosed the tumor and referred her to a brain surgeon. Exploratory surgery revealed a low-grade astrocytoma that could not be completely removed. and would not remain slow-growing for very long.

Although there was no guarantee, radiation therapy was recommended. Pam received hyperfractionated treatments twice daily for eight weeks with beams targeted directly at her tumor. This was less debilitating than full-brain radiation, but it seemed to accomplish nothing. It may even have stimulated new tumor growth. By the Spring of 1988, Pam’s tumor was twice its original size. It was at this point that the doctors began urging her to try chemotherapy, even though such treatment has never been shown to be very effective against brain tumors. Pam knew about the possible side effects from chemotherapy and wasn’t willing to accept them.

Just as Pam and her husband, Scott, were about to move to Los Angeles to be near her family, she got a call from her sister, whose mother-in-law had seen a doctor named Burzynski on the Sally Jesse Raphael TV. He was curing cancer someplace in Texas. Pam and Scott were desperate and, even though some people they asked dismissed Dr. Burzynski as a “quack,” Scott told his wife that he would do whatever she wanted, spend whatever it took. They flew to Houston to check out Dr. Burzynski. By that time, Pam was so weak and lethargic that she had to lean on Scott to walk and she had severe double vision.

They were skeptical, and neither was impressed by the clinic, which was very small and economical in the mid- and late-1980’s . In their first, short meeting with Dr. Burzynski, he acted as if he had no doubt that Pam’s tumor would respond to his medication. Pam and Scott were scared and he was still very doubtful, but they concluded that they might as well try the therapy because there was nothing else left to do. The Winninghams rented an apartment in Houston for two weeks, so Pam could start antineoplastons therapy.

Within days, Pam became a patient of the clinic. She had a catheter inserted in her chest for the medication and she had an MRI scan done locally so there would be a record of the exact size and shape of her tumor before she began treatment. The whole process was very well organized and Pam was monitored for two weeks to adjust her medication and see how she was tolerating it. Mostly, she slept during that time, but there were absolutely no side effects. Eventually, the Winninghams took the medication home to California and began a routine of going back to Houston every two months for more antineoplastons and an evaluation.

The MRI scan Pam underwent after starting the treatment, in July 1988, showed a significant reduction in the swelling around her tumor, but no difference in tumor size.
Her next MRI, two months later, showed an estimated 30% to 40% decrease in tumor volume. Suddenly, she had reason to hope that she would live. This was reinforced by the next MRI, which showed an estimated 20% to 30% reduction in size from the previous scan. Her astrocytoma was gradually disappearing.

As her treatment progressed successfully, Pam’s and Scott’s feelings about Dr. Burzynski grew more positive. They looked forward to going back to Houston and it was reassuring whenever they saw him. She also enjoyed the moral support she got from the clinic staff.

By the following January, there was no sign of the tumor. The report on her MRI taken that month stated that “since the previous study, this region [where the tumor was located in the brain stem] has undergone a marked decrease in size . . . This suggests that the lesion may now consist of scarring or even old hemorrhage.”

Pam now has new MRI scans taken every January. All show something, probably scar tissue, where her tumor once was. Within a month after her MRI’s began showing tumor reduction and Pam was able to lower her dependence on Decadron, she started to regain her old energy. Evntually, she and Scott relocated to New Jersey, where both went to work for the same financial consulting firm.

Only one ill effect of her disease remains: The palsy that affected her face during the 1970’s and became most severe at the height of her tumor growth has not completely disappeared. Her doctors think this may be a lingering problem caused by nerve damage from the surgery and radiation she had.

But neither she nor Scott cares much about that. Not when they think about her new life without cancer. “It’s such a wonderful feeling to be alive these many years after they told me I’d be dead,” Pam says. Pam and Scott have now seen their daughter, Lynn, graduate from Yale University and go on to graduate school. They’ve taken cruises and toured in Europe. She’s been totally clear of cancer since going off of antineoplastons in 1989. Pam now works at an economic consulting firm in Princeton, NJ and does pottery and sculpture projects as a hobby. She walks two miles at lunchtime four times a week to stay in shape.

And if anything went wrong, if a new brain tumor suddenly appeared ? Pam says, “If that happened, I’d go back on antineoplastons right away. There would be no hesitation at all.”