Woman claims she 'cured' skin cancer by BURNING a huge hole in her chest

February 11, 2016  19:49

A woman claims to have cured a melanoma on her chest using a controversial alternative medicine condemned by doctors known as black salve ointment.

Brita Hollows, from Taupo in New Zealand, opted for the alternate treatment after noticing a freckle on her chest had started to rise and change colour in the centre within the space of two weeks.

The 63-year-old said she researched the use of black salve and the traditional method of having the melanoma cut out before she started using the ointment made by a herbalist. 

Ms Hollows did not seek medical advice from a doctor, nor did she have a biopsy to determine if it was a melanoma.

She documented the changes and effects the black salve had on her body by taking photos over a 12 month period. 

The photos have since gone viral on Facebook after Ms Hollows shared them via her healing page Brita Hollows - Conscious Energy. The post was met with a mixed response with some praising her and others condemning her actions due to her lack of medical experience. 

Ms Hollows said her self-diagnosed treatment took about six weeks.

Ms Hollows took the last photo documenting the process a few weeks ago to show show her scarring healed and says she is in the all clear.

'There was a bit of a crater after it fell out - there's not much flesh in that area. It's all fine. I have nothing there, I'm healthy. I had a blood test and it was all clear,' she said.  

It comes after a Brisbane man created an inch-wide hole in his head after using an alternate treatment thought to be black salve to treat a lesion.

The 55-year-old man presented to Princess Alexandra Emergency Department in Brisbane after applying the unlicensed treatment to his face for four months.

His case appeared in the Medical Journal of Australia where doctors, Natalie Ong, Eric Sham and Brandon Adams, wrote that black salve could lead to scarring and disfigurement because it often contained an alkaloid from bloodroot and zinc chloride.

 

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