ABSTRACT
The concept of scientific complementary medicine arose from the growing awareness that cytotoxic tumour destructive therapies (e.g. radiotherapy, chemotherapy)
obviously fail to provide a reasonable benefit for patients suffering from advanced carcinomas. Although the toxicity of chemo/radiotherapeutic regimens ultimately increased, demanding stem cell transplantation and other cost-intensive supports, no statistically evaluable benefit on overall survival could be observed for most patients with advanced carcinomas. These disappointing data and missing therapeutical options finally resulted in the definition of criteria other than survival to suggest a therapeutical benefit. Accordingly, remission rate (further specified in complete/ partial remission) was postulated to correlate with therapeutical success, however, biometric metaanalysis totally neglected this correlation (Abel, 1995; Moss (1995). Some studies even demonstrated inverse correlations between remission and patient survival, however, it is still established as a marker of therapeutical success.
