Cancer therapy: When all else fails

Lawrence Burgh has a sober outlook on life. A 48-year-old physician whose career has centred on treating seriously ill patients, Burgh was diagnosed with cancer in December 2006. Yet despite his clinical experience, he has taken an extraordinary step to try to rid himself of his illness, a step many would consider to be a medical heresy.

Burgh is one of a growing number of patients who have been dosing themselves with a simple laboratory chemical that has never before been used to treat cancer in people. Most are doing so without the help of doctors, and none is enrolled in any systematic clinical trial of the substance. Instead, they are buying it over the internet, and sharing their experiences of it in online chatrooms. For them, the unlicensed, untested drug represents their last best chance of survival.