A throat cancer sufferer has hailed his ‘miraculous’ recovery from painful sores and blisters after using a cream originally used to treat the udders of milk cows.
Luke Luetkemeyer, 63, from Las Vegas, Nevada, underwent radiation treatment for the cancer after he was diagnosed in May last year.
Shortly after starting, the school supervisor started to break out in painful blisters all over his face and neck, which persisted with each round of radiation treatment battling cancer in his lymph nodes.
His sores and blisters stemmed from the base of his neck to the sides of his face and behind his ears.
His wife Cindy, 61, a speech therapist, had read about a cream that is popular in Australia, MooGoo Skincare, which was originally used to treat the udders of milk cows and had reportedly helped others with eczema and blisters.
She ordered it online in September, and within a couple of weeks of applying it three times a day, his blistering side effects were barely visible in pictures.
Luke Luetkemeyer, 63, from Las Vegas, had radiation treatment for cancer after he was diagnosed in May last year but it gave him sores. His wife found a cream for cows’ udders online which cleared up his sores as the radiation therapy cleared his cancer
Transformed: The cream cleared Luke’s blisters within days (see before, left, and after, right)
Cindy said: ‘I saw a difference within 24 hours. I know it sounds dramatic but it’s true. I was astonished. It really was a miracle.
‘My husband was in so much pain, and this cream completely turned his life around as he went through the radiation treatment.’
Luke’s ordeal began in May, when he first noticed a lump on his neck while shaving.
However, it wasn’t until he was at a retreat a few weeks later he realized it could be something serious.
‘There was a doctor there and he told me I needed to go get it checked out,’ Luke said.
‘I happened to have a visit with my cardiologist and I showed him the lump. and asked him what he thought.
‘He referred me to someone and the next morning they did a biopsy. Four days later they called me to come into the office.
‘He told me I had throat cancer, which was of course a shock.’
Two days later, Luke and his wife were on their way to UCLA. He was told he had a tumor at the base of his tongue, around the size of half his little fingernail. The lump on his neck was a result of his lymph nodes being infected.
Luke was told he needed surgery, and the surgeons needed to cut a significant part of his tongue out, which could have a severe impact on his speech and ability to eat.
However, he decided to opt for radiation therapy instead, and went to the M.D. Anderson Center in Houston.
Luke said: ‘I wanted to go with function over cure, so I decided to have the proton radiation therapy treatment [a targeted form of radiotherapy].’
At the beginning of July, Luke and Cindy packed up their stuff and moved to Houston so he could get treatment.
It was just two weeks after the radiation started he began to get painful blisters and welts over his neck and face.
Luke said he had some ‘really dark, dark days, and I didn’t know I was going to make it through the process’ but he said: ‘God was good and my wife was incredible as far as her care went, and I made it through and I’m fine’
Luke said: ‘I couldn’t tell whether the pain was on the inside of the outside. They gave me some good medication, but it was still terrible.’
The burns and blisters are a typical side effect of radiation treatment.
Cindy first started applying an ointment called Egyptian Magic, which had been recommended, but it wasn’t giving Luke any relief.
Then they heard stories about other people finding relief from MooGoo.
The lotion made in Australia was originally developed to keep cows’ udders soft. The firm’s founder, Craig Jones, noticed his mom was slathering her face with a thick paste to treat a skin condition. He asked her what it was, and she said it was the same thing she used on her cows’ udders to keep them supple.
Jones helped reformulate his mom’s recipe so it was lighter to use, and then decided to market the product out.
It soon became a hit in Australia, and is spreading worldwide as a treatment for a variety of human skin conditions, including severe cases of eczema.
Luke says the relief was instant: ‘There was a soothing relief. And then it seemed to penetrate into the skin with a tremendous soothing relief.’
Blisters are common side effects of radiation therapy. Patients are advised to use ointments but it didn’t do anything for Luke until he got the cream
He used it from that moment on throughout his treatment, which lasted 14 days, and then up until November, using it three times a day.
Luke added applying the cream also brought him closer to his wife: ‘It was a very intimate time for Cindy and I because she was applying this stuff to my neck, which was pretty messed up, and they were such a comfort in it.
‘It was one of the closest times we have had while we have been married and we have had a good marriage.’
He added: ‘I had some really dark, dark days, and I didn’t know I was going to make it through the process.
‘But God was good and my wife was incredible as far as her care went, and I made it through and I’m fine.’
Cindy says even the hospital staff in Las Vegas were staggered by the difference: ‘We started on the Wednesday and came back on the Friday and they asked, “What have you been putting on his neck? How come it looks so much better?” They were stunned.’
Thanks to Luke’s radiation therapy, he now has no signs of cancer.