MERLIN L. WILLCOX, MD PHD
ACADEMIC CLINICAL LECTURER, SCHOOL OF PRIMARY CARE, POPULATION SCIENCES AND MEDICAL EDUCATION AT UNIVERSITY OF SOUTHAMPTON

MRCGP (LONDON) ROYAL COLLEGE OF GENERAL PRACTITIONERS

DPHIL AND BM BCH AT UNIVERSITY OF OXFORD

NOW MORE THAN EVER BEFORE, it is imperative that humanity learns to value its profound dependence on the natural world as we witness its destruction at an unprecedented pace. It is widely recognized that we depend on our environment to supply our basic needs for food, water and natural resources. The importance of biodiversity is increasingly recognized as we continue to find new medicines from plants, although many species are becoming extinct before we even discover them. However, our bonds with the earth go even further. Many studies now prove the importance of green spaces for mental well-being. This book helps to deepen our understanding of the spiritual connections between human wellness and nature—extending the proverb of “mens sana in corpore sano” to “a healthy mind in a healthy environment”. Not only is nature necessary for preserving our sanity, but it can also help to heal us when we are ill.

MAPPING CAVES takes this discussion to a new level. As a primary care physician and medical researcher, I see how our world is now dominated by evidence- based medicine and cost-effectiveness studies, which are of course essential when deciding between different modern medicines and expensive treatments. In parallel, patients are increasingly interested in integrative healthcare, which combines the advantages of conventional and complementary approaches. Not only is there a growing body of evidence demonstrating that many complementary therapies can be effective for treating certain conditions; these therapies often take a more “holistic” view of the patient, rather than focusing on a single organ or condition. This extends the understanding of our interdependence with nature; a consideration that involves deep philosophical principles. Dr. Noble-Letort offers fresh insights into how nature can help us to heal by seeing disease in a new way and having a more positive frame of mind.

This is a truly interdisciplinary book, integrating perspectives from medicine, psychology, history, philosophy, anthropology and mythology - not only Greek and Roman but multicultural mythologies found in Native American and African, Hindu and Buddhist, Judeo-Christian and Islam, Prehistory and Modern stories. Many health professionals regard myths as obstacles to be overcome and countered, when giving correct information about prevention and treatment of disease. This book counterbalances this view, with examples of how traditional myths—and patient’s “personal” myths—can help us to understand different perspectives. Everyone who reads it will find their horizons are broadened and will gain a multifaceted understanding of our interconnectedness with the natural world.

2021

Academic Publication - Human-Earth Expressions on Integrative Health and Our Environment, Cambridge Scholars. United Kingdom
https://www.cambridgescholars.com/product/978-1-5275-6468-8/

2019

Keynote Speaker at PAMA Conference at UCLA, Los Angeles California USA August 2018

2018

Recipient of Top 40 CitInion at International Congress fo Integrative Medicine and Healta (ICIMH) in Maryland USA - Integrative Health Group Visits (IHGV): A Pilot Feasibility Study to Manage People with Chronic Pain in a Nordic Inner-City Medical Clinic, Baltimore, Maryland USA May 2018

2017

Keynote Speaker (Copenhagen) – VII World Voice Consortium, Copenhagen, Denmark 2017, December 8-10. http://www.worldvoiceconsortium.org/world-voice-consortium-congress-2017.html

Lecture at PLO Lægedage Skouby S, Bitsch M, Noble-Letort SR, Nielsen NM. Menopausens Mange Behandlingsmuligheder. PLO Lægedage Copenhagen Denmark 2017, November 16.

Keynote Speaker (China) – AIRS Institute for the Advancement of International Rehabilitation Standards of Basel Switzerland, 2nd Orenda International Psychosomatic Summit. Beijing, China 2017, October 28-29.

Pilot Feasibility Study (Copenhagen) – Integrative Health Group Visits (IHGV): A Pilot Feasibility Study to Manage People with Chronic Pain in a Nordic Inner-City Medical Clinic, Copenhagen Denmark, September 13 – October 25, 2017

Danish Parliament Deputation – Sundheds –og Ældreudvalget Folketinget Christiansborg Copenhagen Denmark 2017, March 8.

Danish Health Authority Report – Sundhedsstyrelsen SRAB, Denmark Noble-Letort, S.R.; Bangsgaard, K. Brief on European/International Best Practice Perspective on CAM research for Danish Health Authority

2016

Danish Parliament Deputation – Forsvarsudvalget Folketinget Christiansborg Copenhagen Denmark 2016, December 8. http://www.ft.dk/samling/20161/almdel/fou/bilag/29/1703588.pdf

Danish Parliament Publication – Noble-Letort SR, Bangsgaard K, Lewith G, Saxer S, Falkenberg T, Zimmerman P, Skovgaard, L. Argumenter for en reformering af den nordiske sundhedspolitik - mod et integreret sundhedssystem 2016 September 25. http://www.ft.dk/samling/20161/almdel/SUU/bilag/87/1693771/index.htm

Noble-Letort SR, Anthonisen M. Det er ikke kun medicin der gør os raske Chora Connection Open Mind Series Copenhagen 2016 June 1. http://choraconnection.dk/shelley-noble-letort-og-komplementaer-medicin/?lang=en

Danish National Health Board Styrelsen for Patientsikkerhed Råd Vedr. Alternativ Behandling Published Interview. Den nordiske amerikaner 2016 April 26. http://www.srab.dk/nyheder/den-nordiske-amerikaner/

Noble-Letort SR. The Nous and Neurogenesis of the Psychesoma: An Integrative Medicine Perspective. Taylor & Francis Routledge Journal of World Futures: The Journal of New Paradigm Research, Vol. 72 2016 Issue 1-2: Symposium of the New Science Paradigm University of Milan, Italy http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/02604027.2016.1143300?journalCode=gwof20

2015

Chronical Publication, Information.dk – Danish National Newspaper
Noble-Letort SR, Riise, Torben. Et paradigmeskift i patientbehandlingen er undervejs, Information Kronik 2015 November 21. https://www.information.dk/debat/2015/11/paradigmeskift-patientbehandlingen-undervejs

8th President of European Congress of Integrative Medicine ECIM 2015 Global Summit on Integrative Medicine and Healthcare, Greater Copenhagen Denmark September 25-27.

Noble-Letort SR. A Summary of the ECIM 2015 Global Summit on Integrative Medicine and Healthcare. Science Press Journal of Integrative Medicine Vol. 13, Issue 6 November 2015 pp 347 – 349. http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2095496415602199 https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4653601/ https://gahmsite.wordpress.com/2015/09/14/nordic-integrative-medicine-sponsors-the-8th-european-congress-on-integrative-medicine-and-a-policy-day-september-25-27-2015/ http://www.ytterjarnaforum.se/vard-omsorg/varldsmote-om-integrativ-vard-%E2%80%A8med-300-forskare-fran-30-lander/?print=1

Keynote Speaker Universidade Lusofona (Portugal) – II Jornadas de Terapeuticas Nao Convencionais. Lisbon, Portugal 2015, June 12-13. http://imt.pt/jornadas2015/

2014

Keynote Speaker X. World Cultural Forum 2014 (China) – High Level Conference on the Protection and Development of Global Traditional Medicine Culture Session 1: New Medical System is Needed with the Development of Ecological Civilization (The Construction of Ecological Civilization Promotes the Blending Development of Traditional Medicine and Modern Medicine). Noble-Letort SR. Integrative Medicine, Sustainability and Patient-Empowered Healthcare: The Importance of Integrating Traditional Medicine into Ecologically Sustainable (Green) Health Care Models. Macau, China 2014, November 13-14. http://thffc.com/zt/2014zyyen/jiabin.htm

Keynote Speaker University of Milan (Italy) – 1st International Symposium on the New Science Paradigm. New Paradigm in Medicine: Noble-Letort SR The Nous and Neurogenesis of the Psychesoma: An Integrative Medicine Perspective. Milan, Italy 2014 March 29-30 http://www.openscienceacademy.eu/wpcontent/uploads/2014/03/EN_Symposium-program.pdf

2013

Guest Lecturer. Copenhagen University Department of Public Health – Noble-Letort SR. Mapping Caves Finding Health: Exploring the New Paradigm of Integrative Medicine and Global Health. 2013 October 22.

2012

Guest Lecturer. Rigshospitalet Copenhagen University Hospital – Noble-Letort SR. Mapping Caves: Exploring the New Paradigm of Integrative Health and Medicine. Tvaerfaglit Videnscenter for Patientstøtte. Rigshospitalet, Copenhagen University Hospital. 2012 August 28.

2011

PhD Dissertation. Pacifica Graduate Institute USA Noble-Letort SR. Mapping Caves: Human-Earth Expressions on Integrative Health and Medicine. Pacific Graduate Institute, Santa Barbara California USA 2011 September 15.

The title of my forthcoming book REIMAGINING CANCER explores how progressive technologies and patient care are reimagining the disease of cancer and its aftermath. People diagnosed with cancer who have chosen these treatments now have a chance to reimagine their future that is inclusive to the possibilites of living a life that can be lived more wholesomely functional and vital.

REIMAGINING CANCER combines evidence-based research on proton therapy, the microbiome and integrative healthcare with personal insights into my cancer journey from disease to renewal of health.

Most would agree that receiving a cancer diagnosis is like receiving a death sentence, especially if you have lived through the witnessing of loved ones dying, like I have, in a way that is agonizingly slow and seemingly inhumane.

Both of my grandparents having suffered through multiple cancer diagnoses (bladder, colon, kidney, ovarian, and rectum) had succumbed to its ultimate end after many long years of treatments. My grandmother fought for 8 years before dying at the age of 56. I was 52 at the time of my diagnosis, so it was not surprising when I learned that I inherited my family’s ancestral genetic mutation.

Of course I wondered, was it my fate to die at her same age?

Over four decades after my grandmothers death, I was lucky to be invited to participate in newly available (pre-COVID 19) RNA genetic testing in addition to routine DNA genetic cancer testing. And so it was confirmed that the growth of my rare genetically-shaped cancerous tumor had been aided far too long by my genetic mutation that allowed my tumor to grow freely undetected by my T- killer cells.

People are fortunate to be living now in a time of exponential growth in medical and healthcare research that can challenge a person’s genetic fate with precision. This new research led me to the most technologically advanced, least invasive cancer therapy treatment—pencil beam intensity-modulated proton therapy (IMPT). Unlike conventional photon radiation (IMRT), IMPT is an advanced form of proton treatment programmed to enter the body and deposit only a small dose of radiation to the surrounding tissue and bones along the way to the targeted tumor and then stopping any radiation-damaging dosage beyond the tumor.

Like most all over the world, I was pressured to start the conventional chemoradiation treatment offered to me in Denmark. Yet I resisted even though I could not find any university hospitals in Europe that were able to provide me with any form of proton cancer therapy whatsoever.

Consequently, I returned home to California where I found the brilliant Dr. Iain MacEwan, who said yes! when everyone else in Europe and America said no. It is Dr. MacEwan to whom I ultimately owe my life and the absolute reason I have been able to publish and continue my work with all my vigor. His offering of IMPT delivered with precision by his team full of expertise and love at the University of California, San Diego (UCSD) affiliate California Protons Cancer Therapy Center was an experience that cannot be expressed sufficiently with words. In addition, I am indebted to now retired UCSD oncologist Professor Lawrence Leichman (who together with Dr. Nigro in 1985 published the Nigro-protocol) also said yes! to accepting me as his very last patient of his career and giving me the perfect gift for my body; a personalized oral capecitabine-based chemoradiation treatment called the Modified-Nigro protocol.

It was my oncologists at UCSD Moores Cancer Center who were the first to refer to me as an “exceptional patient” and subsequently it was my Danish gastrointestinal specialist Dr. Peter Svenningsen who first deemed me “cured” (officially confirmed later by a F-18-FDG inj. PET/CT, the same exact machine that confirmed my initial diagnosis) at my one year control when he found not a trace of neither the tumor, nor any radiation damage whatsoever. Since Dr. Svenningsen was also the first to see my tumor in all its bloody ferociousness, said that if he had not already seen my tumor, he would not believe that it ever existed.

What was amazing to most was the most superficial. I did not lose my hair, nor did I have any chemotherapy-induced mouth sores. The doctors were especially perplexed that I did not need a blood transfusion, not even pharmaceuticals for my pain. My immune system remained resilient via regenerative cell nutrition and a strict adherence to the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) food safety guidelines for people with cancer. My pain remained endurable via support from a team of integrative health practitioners. After having completed 5 years of controls with additional support of various forms of integrative therapies, my regenerated body remains fully functional.

It is my hope that one day, evidence-based integrative therapies will be fully integrated into conventional patient care. And stories about absolute healing and renewal of tissues because of the adaptations into healthcare of the least toxic and most effective cancer treatments will no longer be considered exceptional but our common rule REIMAGINING CANCER.

Pacifica Graduate Institute (PGI) offers the only accredited academic doctoral program "dedicated to the exploration of human experience through the interdisciplinary and multicultural study of myth, ritual, religion, literature, depth psychology, and art.

The PGI Mythological Studies Program "operates on the underlying assumption that myth has the power to touch our deepest creative energies and to generate symbolic images that confer significance upon the complexity of modern life and history. Myth thrives on paradox, ambiguity, and the shape-shifting ways that metaphor informs and transforms our lives."

All sectors of society, including healthcare and the environment, are "at the cusp of a paradigm shift in which outmoded mechanistic, reductive modes of thinking are being replaced by more complex, reanimated worldviews. The study of myth, story and fable with its storehouse of narratives and images can help guide us by facilitating our personal and collective transition into a more vibrant reality. Myth reveals the unconscious narratives of both past and present, making the study of myth vitally important to our time."

What is Depth Psychology?

Depth Psychology attends to the way unconscious processes express themselves in society and culture, and how culture affects the psyche.

Depth psychologists attempt to understand the language and the dynamics of the unconscious as it manifests in their work with clients and in the world.

Depth psychological approaches to psychological suffering attempt to help individuals become aware of what has been cast out of consciousness or not yet able to be known. Healing is associated with allowing what has been repressed, rejected, denied or ignored to come forward so that the person can understand, explore its significance and integrate it, allowing for a transformation in consciousness.

I am a fifth generation Californian, where I raised my children in the beautiful community of Santa Barbara. Before moving to Copenhagen, I co-founded the Santa Barbara Birth Center, the first freestanding birth center serving Santa Barbara County, California (population 500,000), voted Best Birth Center in the USA. 

My community involvement includes environmental, therapeutic and philanthropic work for private and public schools, societies, and non-profit organizations such as the Peabody Charter School’s Foundation, Exploration Center, and Edible Schoolyard Cafeteria (In 2007, I spearheaded the first parent-student run Organic Milk Project delivering hand-poured certified organic milk into compostable cups to over 500 students daily). I remain a founding member of the Partnership Council of the Community Environmental Council (CEC) of Santa Barbara, a catalyst for the internationally recognized yearly celebration of Earth Day.

As a former competitive gymnast and a life-long practitioner of yoga, I understand the multitude of benefits gained through sports and movement training. I extend my professional expertise through the certifications as experienced Yoga Alliance (E-RYT) teacher since 1999 and yoga therapist (C-IAYT) since 2004, specializing in prenatal yoga in preparation for childbirth called Yogabirth® as well as rehabilitative yoga called Yoga for the Heart, for people living-or caregiving a loved one-with chronic diseases or life-threatening illnesses.

My most profound teachers were Nischala Joy Devi, founding developer of the yoga portion of The Dean Ornish Program for Reversing Heart Disease and co-founder of the award-winning Commonweal Cancer Help Program as well as Rachel Naomi Remen MD, the founder of The Healer’s Art and The Institute for the Study of Health and Illness (ISHI) at Commonweal.

Everyday is a joy to be with my Danish husband Claus Letort, especially when we are sharing our mutual love for nature and organic food culture. Together we have five Danish/American children who live in Copenhagen, Denmark and Santa Barbara, California.

I consider myself a global citizen having lived-worked-studied in over 15 countries worldwide.