Max Gerson

Max Gerson (October 18, 1881 – March 8, 1959) was a German-born American physician who developed the Gerson therapy, a pseudoscientific dietary-based alternative cancer treatment that he falsely claimed could cure cancer and most chronic, degenerative diseases. Gerson therapy involves a plant-based diet with coffee enemas, ozone enemas, dietary supplements, and raw calf liver extract; the latter was discontinued in the 1980s after patients were hospitalized for bacterial infections. Gerson described his approach in the book A Cancer Therapy: Results of 50 Cases (1958). The National Cancer Institute evaluated Gerson's claims and concluded that his data showed no benefit from his treatment. The therapy is both ineffective and dangerous. Serious illness and deaths have resulted from Gerson therapy.