Why Are Kids Getting Cancer? | Dagmara Beine

Dagmara Beine (0:00)

I had two miscarriages in a row. My OB, who I liked very much, said, oh, just take this drug, Clomid, no big deal, and then you'll get pregnant. Just try this first. Got pregnant with Zusa. I was trying to explain why did Zusa get cancer. And I found a study that's really hard to find anymore that showed women who took Clomid, their kids had up to 50% increased risk of leukemia. It's always a perfect storm. It's always multiple things. We followed the vaccine schedule for Zusa when she was young. We gave her Tylenol and ibuprofen more than I would have ever looking back. We moved to a house that had a ton of glyphosate. Childhood cancer is not random. It's through the environmental factors of their parents. So we now have multiple studies that show us what the mom did dramatically impacts the child. There's always hope. You are not a statistic.

Alex Clark (1:17)

What if cancer isn't just bad luck? Today we're talking about what may actually increase your risk, how to use your labs to catch dysfunction before it becomes disease, and how epigenetic testing can reveal what your body may be susceptible to, so you can make changes before your environment and lifestyle pull the trigger. Today's guest is Dagmara Beine, an integrative oncology clinician, physician assistant, and PhD, who transformed unimaginable personal tragedy into a life's mission. After losing her daughter to an aggressive form of leukemia, she dedicated her career to helping patients understand cancer risk, navigate the medical system, and advocate for themselves. Watch this one on the real Alex Clark YouTube channel or Culture Apothecary on Spotify. If you've never left a five-star review for this show, it takes 10 seconds on Spotify or Apple to do it, and it tremendously helps us out. Please welcome integrative oncology clinician, Dagmara Beine to Culture Apothecary.

You spent over a decade working in the ER. Is that right?

Dagmara Beine (2:15)

Yes. So when I came out of school, I was a physician assistant, 23 years old. I looked young. They made me wear a white coat, so people would believe that somebody actually came in the room because there was complaints that nobody actually came in the room. And I was at the tail end of medicine. So that's when people would get diagnosed with their heart attacks or their cancer. And I would hear over and over again, but my labs were just normal. But back then, that's what I did. I was learning how to save lives. And then my daughter, who was three and a half, was diagnosed with cancer. And that kind of flipped my whole world upside down.

And I left the ER because I wanted to leave no rock unturned for her, as you would for your child who gets diagnosed.

She was diagnosed with a really rare form of leukemia. So most kids that you hear of get diagnosed with leukemia. It's the number one cancer in kids. It's very, the prognosis is very good. Zuzza got a really bad type of leukemia, AML, and so her prognosis was very poor.

Alex Clark (3:24)

And what sorts of options were you given by conventional medicine doctors for her leukemia?

Dagmara Beine (3:29)

So the only thing that they do for leukemia for kids is chemotherapy, and they said that she would have had to have a bone marrow transplant because it was such an aggressive leukemia. Both my husband and I were working in the emergency department.

We knew what we knew, but there was a lot we didn't know. I wasn't in the holistic alternative integrative medicine space yet. But right away when they told me that I should be feeding her formula, which had high fructose corn syrup and seed oils in it, this light bulb went on, and I was like, oh, they know their chemotherapy, but they don't know how to take care of the whole zoosa. And so I went out to look for an integrative pediatric oncology expert, and I couldn't find one.

Alex Clark (4:12)

I'm surprised with all of your background in conventional medicine that you kind of had this thought of, they're not looking at the whole person. I need to find somebody else. Like, that seems shocking to me, that you would even think to do that.

Dagmara Beine (4:27)

Yeah. Well, when you, I mean, we know nutrition matters.

We're not taught that through anybody, especially primary care. But we knew in our household that nutrition mattered. And so when I knew that the formulary at the hospital was giving such horrible nutritional options, like it was such a light bulb, and then it just snowballed. And since I couldn't find somebody to take care of her, because a pediatric oncology integrative expert didn't exist, I left the ER to become the expert because I needed to save my daughter.