The key point about this defense system is that a new phase does not start until the previous phase has been successfully completed. At any point where the agents available are qualitatively insufficient to defend against the noxious influence, the sequence breaks down. Then the body overcompensates by manufacturing excessive amounts of the defense agents from the breakdown point, and it does not progress to the next phase. Revici found that most chronic diseases, including cancer, are characterized by such abnormal conditions. When the body's defense is arrested in the lipidic phase, either fatty acids or sterols are produced in abnormally large quantities, leading to a variety of disorders, including cancer.

Patients diagnosed with an excess of sterols are treated with fatty acids to correct the imbalance. Conversely, patients found to have a predominance of fatty acids are treated with sterols and other agents.

This "biologically guided chemotherapy," as Dr. Revici calls it, is highly individualized to suit each person's specific metabolic character and condition. "There are simply no two cancers which are alike, just as no two individuals are alike," he has said.2 The substances and dosages used are unique for each patient and can be changed if analytical tests reveal a change in the body's balance. Through regular tests, such as the urine pH, specific gravity, surface tension, and chloride index, Dr. Revici can detect systemic changes in the body produced by lipid imbalances.

Revici's research has demonstrated that lipids have an affinity for tumors and other abnormal tissues. Because of this, the lipids or lipid-like synthetic compounds administered to the patient, either by mouth or injection, travel directly to the tumor or lesion. Cancerous tissue is abnormally rich in free lipids, and the lipidic agents introduced into the bloodstream are readily taken up by the tumor.

Revici's nontoxic cancer therapy has been denied both fair testing and funding in the United States, though it has been studied and put into practice in France, Italy, and Austria. A distinguished physician and research scientist who graduated first in his class at the University of Bucharest, Dr. Revici has been stereotypically portrayed by the American media as a quack who should have been put out of business a long time ago. The American Cancer Society put Revici's therapy on its Unproven Methods blacklist in 1961, and in 1984, the State of New York tried to revoke his medical license permanently on grounds of deviation from standard medicine, negligence, incompetence, fraud, the use of unapproved experimental drugs, and similar charges. After four years of struggle, Revici triumphed in duly 1988 with a decision that placed him on probation but allows him to continue treating cancer patients.

To save his license, Revici's patients and several medical civil-liberties groups undertook intensive lobbying at the state capitol. At the federal level, New York Congressman Guy Molinari held an all-day hearing in March 1988 to address the Revici matter and the whole field of alternative cancer therapies. Dr. Seymour Brenner, a respected radiation oncologist in private practice in New York, testified on Revici's behalf He had investigated a number of patients in very advanced stages of cancer, incurable by orthodox means, whom Revici had put into long remissions. Dr. Brenner had an independent panel of pathologists confirm the diagnosis and stage of illness prior to each patient's initial visit to Revici. He testified that his personal findings strongly suggest Revici has a cancer treatment deserving further study, and he proposed that such an evaluation be conducted by the FDA.