Diet in the prevention of cancer and ancer metastasis

[kick-prostate-cancer]

Sent to my by a friend ...

Are You Eating These 8 Nutrients That Block Cancer Metastasis?

By Dr. David Jockers DC, MS, CSCS

Diet plays a major role in both the prevention of cancer and the contributing factors of cancer growth and cancer metastasis. In fact, 75%-85% of cancers diagnosed in one study in the United States showed that unhealthy lifestyle factors were the primary causes of these diagnosis and may have been prevented with improved dietary changes. Researchers believe that 30% of deaths associated with cancer today can be prevented from diet alone.

Evidence links plant-based foods with some of the best known chemoprotective (cancer-preventing) properties. The phytochemicals they contain interfere with cellular communication that triggers inflammation and stimulates the progression of cancer in the body.

8 Nutrients That Help Block Cancer Metastasis

The following 8 nutrients are some of the best dietary compounds you can introduce into your diet daily to inhibit the spread of cancer. Incorporating foods containing these nutrients will help starve cancer growth, substantially reducing your risk of developing cancer and may even reverse the progression of cancer that has already spread.

#1. Ursolic Acid:

Ursolic acid is a plant oil and phytonutrient. It is found in herbs like holy basil and oregano, the skin on apples, and bilberries.

One of the key characteristics of cancer cells is their ability to disable the normal mechanism of cells to undergo apoptosis. This programmed cell death also referred to as cellular suicide prevents abnormalities in cells from multiplying but is turned off in cancer cells. Disabling apoptosis contributes to the activity of cancer to metastasize and promote tumor growth.

An increase in dietary ursolic acid is associated with the treatment of cancer pertaining to the pancreas, cervix, lung, colon, skin, and breast. Ursolic acid has been shown to disrupt cancerous activity by destroying the survival mechanisms that cancer cells are reliant upon. For instance, ursolic acid turns on apoptosis thus inhibiting the replication of damaged DNA and cancer metastasis.

#2. Vitamin D:

Vitamin D is critical to the production of a cancer-fighting protein called GcMAF. GcMAF inhibits cancer metastasis and even has the capability to reverse the devastating effects of cancer on the body. Receiving a healthy dose of vitamin D daily supports GcMAF synthesis and consequently shuts down pro-cancer receptors and enzymes that encourage metastasis.

Another protein linked to a reduction in cancerous activity is DBP-maf (vitamin D binding protein-macrophage activating factor). DBP-maf directly stimulates the immune response by suppressing blood vessel growth (angiogenesis) required for cancer cell migration and tumor growth. DBP-maf requires vitamin D for transport through the bloodstream.

Vitamin D intake is shown effective at inhibiting the growth and development of tumors including its metastasis associated with prostate cancer, colorectal, breast cancer, and melanoma. Increase your vitamin D levels by exposing your skin to sunlight daily without added sunscreen protection. Add vitamin D-rich foods to your diet including wild caught salmon, organic and pastured eggs, mushrooms, and fermented (not pasteurized) dairy or whole milk from grass-fed cows.

#3. Curcumin:

Curcumin is the compound that gives turmeric its yellow color. It is a powerful antioxidant that can prevent and treat diseases associated with chronic inflammation like cancer. Curcumin has been traditionally used as an herbal remedy in Chinese and Indian medicine for a variety of health ailments.

By regulating apoptosis and inhibiting cancer cell growth, curcumin is included in numerous medical products as a therapeutic agent to support a healthy immune system. Curcumin is shown in studies to act as a potent free radical scavenger. It also blocks the production of TNF (tumor necrosis factor) which increases pro-inflammatory signals and stimulates tumor growth.

Curcumin has been demonstrated in clinical studies to inhibit the proliferation of cancer cells and metastasis associated with a variety of cancers. These include breast, uterine, ovarian, kidney, bladder, renal, brain, leukemia, colorectal, liver, pancreatic, lung, and non-Hodgkin lymphoma.

Add curcumin to your diet by incorporating the spice turmeric into marinades, soups, chili and stews, herbal teas, or a preparation of what is called “golden milk” (a combination of the yellow spice turmeric along with coconut milk and/or coconut oil.

#4. EGCG:

The cancer-preventive effects of EGCG (epigallocatechin-3-gallate) has been closely studied for almost three decades now. EGCG is a polyphenolic compound that is commonly known for its concentration in green tea. It is one of the primary nutrients associated with improving health and healing in ancient Chinese medicine. Consumption of EGCG is believed to suppress tumor growth associated with several tissues in the body such as the prostate, bladder, intestines, liver, pancreas, lungs, and oral cavity.

Although many of the biological pathways that this nutrient influences to inhibit cancer metastasis remain unknown, it has been recently discovered that EGCG binds to a protein receptor, 67LR, responsible for cancerous activity. By attaching itself to this cancer-causing protein, EGCG inhibits metastasis by preventing angiogenesis responsible for cancer cell migration. EGCG also induces apoptosis supporting the destruction of cancer cells.

The high EGCG content in green tea exhibits various ways to promote health of the whole body. Research indicates that daily green tea consumption improves gut microflora which is essential to optimizing the health of the immune system. Coupling a healthy whole foods and plant-based diet with at least one cup of green tea daily can support your fight against chronic diseases and prevent the spread of cancer in your body.

#5. Sulforaphane:

One of the best chemoprotective nutrients that prevents the formation of free radicals and growth of tumors is sulforaphane. This nutrient reduces inflammation and protects against cancer growth by boosting the body’s natural detoxification pathways to eliminate toxins and support the immune response.

Sulforaphane is shown to fight the spread of cancer by inhibiting the activation of cancer cells. Sulforaphane inhibits metastasis of cancers associated with the spleen, colon, prostate, stomach, and breast.

Broccoli sprouts are one of the best foods to eat to inhibit the spread of cancer in your body. Other excellent food choices are cruciferous vegetables like cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, and kale. These foods are also high in chemoprotective nutrients glutathione, amino acids, chlorophyll, and a variety of other vitamins and nutrients to improve health.

#6. Quercetin:

Quercetin is a super antioxidant that stimulates the body’s natural detoxification pathways and exhibits natural anti-cancer properties. High intake of quercetin in an individual’s diet suppresses cancer cell proliferation, reduces oxidative damage, and inhibits the activity of a mutant gene associated with tumor growth known as P53.

This dietary flavonoid shows promising evidence in treating breast cancer, leukemia, lung cancer, neuroblastoma, and colon cancer.

Foods high in quercetin include onions, capers, blackberries, raspberries, black and green tea, dark cherries, cocoa powder, kale, apples, and herbs like sage and parsley.

#7. Apigenin:

This flavonoid exhibits chemopreventive properties by inhibiting the invasion of cancer cells to new tissue and the growth of tumors. Apigenin reduces free radical activity and aids in the elimination of toxins from the body. It has been extensively used to maintain the health of the stomach, kidneys, liver, and blood.

The protection against cancer cell migration is one of the best influences apigenin has on preventing cancer metastasis. Researchers have even found that topical treatments containing extracts of apigenin are effective at suppressing the growth of skin tumors and reducing the signs of damage associated with UV exposure to the skin.

Apigenin is found in many fruits and vegetables like grapefruit, onions, and oranges. It is also found in beverages sourced from plants including chamomile teas. Parsley is one of the best dietary sources of apigenin that you can easily add to your diet. Consider juicing parsley, adding it to salads, and flavoring your favorite dishes.

#8. Luteolin:

Another anticancer flavonoid present in a plant based diet is luteolin. Luteolin is found in green peppers, chamomile teas, and celery. Its antioxidant effects are shown to protect the lungs, liver, and heart tissue from inflammation and exhibit protection against the degenerative effects of cancerous activity.

Despite the extensive investigation into the chemoprotective effects of luteolin on the body over the past half millennium, not all of its biological health benefits are known. Scientists are certain however that these citrus flavonoids, luteolin and apigenin, are generally found in low concentrations in foods but exhibit a greater effect at preventing metastasis than do common dietary compounds.

Luteolin inhibits the activation of cancer cells by suppressing pro-cancer enzymes, blocking the accumulation of carcinogens in new tissue and supporting the elimination of toxic agents. Consequently, luteolin is an effective dietary antioxidant that produces an anti-proliferative and anti-metastatic effect on the human body.

Summary

Avoiding processed foods, sugars, and conventional meats and dairy products that break down your body’s natural immune defenses is critical to your health. Eat to starve cancer by feeding your body the 8 nutrients listed above to stimulate apoptosis in cancer cells, prevent angiogenesis and consequently inhibit tumor formation and cancer metastasis to other areas of the body.

[tennis4life]

Dining on most of these puppies! Hope the other 50 supplements that I take make up for the two that I don't take in the above list! Blessings to all!

[cujoe]

Good list. Probably good advice to try to first get them from the foods you eat.

And when you supplement, eat a food with it that is high in the supplement (or is complementary to it) to make sure activating/support synergies needed to maximize the benefits are being metabolized.

Eat Well to Be/Stay Well - cujoe

[pjoshea13]

Jockers claims that:

"Diet plays a major role in both the prevention of cancer and the contributing factors of cancer growth and cancer metastasis. In fact, 75%-85% of cancers diagnosed in one study in the United States showed that unhealthy lifestyle factors were the primary causes of these diagnosis and may have been prevented with improved dietary changes. Researchers believe that 30% of deaths associated with cancer today can be prevented from diet alone."

This is the sort of statement that contributes to those with cancer feeling they are to blame for their cancers & maybe deserve to get cancer because they always knew that eating (... insert one of the usual suspects ...) was wrong. & didn't Dr. Greger say that vegans never get cancer?

I subscribe to to view that most (maybe two-thirds of) cancers are due to chance. If one considers the extraordinary number of cell divisions that occur in the body every day (two trillion), the range of protection mechanisms that have evolved to deal with division errors, and the limited effectiveness of those mechanisms, it's clear that we cannot ignore the possibility that errors can happen that do not depend on eating at fast food chains.

There is a strange idea that the body is intrinsically perfect & that nothing bad can happen if one puts in the correct nutrient formula. & then there is the crazy idea that reverting to the "perfect" diet can coax cancer cells into normalcy.

But how could I object to that list? Except that food will not deliver a pharnacological dose of those nutrients when cancer has been established.

Here is a study to support my "bad luck" view:

scientificamerican.com/arti...

-Patrick

[cujoe in reply to pjoshea13]

Have to beg to differ with you this time, Patrick. I come from a family riddled with cancer and have been bedside to witness the death of four of them from various (all different) cancers. My two remaining siblings both have/had cancer and I have the misfortune of having two.

For my entire life, I have heard my family talk of "it must be in our genes". Not a single one of them ever had a lifestyle or dietary profile that was even moderately conducive to long-term good health. Yet, even after seeing parents and siblings die from cancer (and even being diagnosed themselves), not a single one (other than me) ever saw fit to make any long-term dietary or lifestyle changes. I say, "Nothing ventured, nothing (to be) gained". And this comes with the knowledge that no familial genetic testing has yet to show any major cancer causing genetic defects.

You seem concerned about guilt that patients may feel upon learning that they have cancer "because they always knew that eating (... insert one of the usual suspects ...) was wrong". Well i can assure you of one thing, I gladly accept the distinct probability that my diet and lifestyle caused/contributed to PCa, and I sincerely wish that 50 years ago I had had access to the information on dietary causation for major western disease that is available today. I made a 180 degree change in my diet and lifestyle shortly after I was diagnosed with my first cancer, CLL. That change "seems" to have paid major dividends for cancer #1, not so much for PCa. (Likely being too little, too late?)

IMO, there is a big difference between feeling guilt for something and assuming responsibly for it. In the first case, people tend toward a negative response. When one assumes responsibility for a condition, it hopefully leads to a positive remedial action.

Just my 2 cents. Be Well - cujoe

[pjoshea13 in reply to cujoe]

Hi Cujoe,

I'm not disputing the importance of environmental factors, including bad nutrition.

Some seem to have an agenda that pins the entire blame on diet. It suits Greger's purpose to demonize all foods that are not vegan. Jockers says "75%-85% of cancers diagnosed in one study" are diet related, but fails to say 33% in another study. If we accept "85%" & add in ~15% for other environmental factors - chemicals in food, air & water, etc., chance doesn't seem to have a role at all. LOL

Best, -Patrick

[cujoe in reply to pjoshea13]

Patrick - the tireless reader and disseminator of all things related to PCa - And one most appreciated for his efforts on behalf of all of us here at HU and beyond,

It seems unfortunate to me that there seems to be the need to diminish ANY responsible view that has the support of valid research related to cancer on this site. For me, it originates in matters of tone more than content. Coming from a background in interdisciplinary (as opposed to multi-disciplinary) design, I find "supported" diversity of opinion on something as complex as cancer to be a good thing - and additive to the synergy of thought that produces the most comprehensive solutions to problems in general. In true interdisciplinary design, every participant, no matter how small or large their discipline component, has an equal place at the table. And often the source of the most insightful inputs are those that cross standard discipline boundaries.

As for origins of cancer, I offer the following from the introduction of of neuroscientist Dr. David Servan-Schreiber's book about his journey of discovery after being diagnosed with brain cancer at age 31, Anticancer: A New Way of Life:

"Cancer lies dormant in all of us. Like all living organisms, our bodies are making defective cells all the time. That's how tumors are born. But our bodies are also equipped with a number of mechanisms that detect and keep such cells in check. In the West, one person in four will die of cancer, but three in four will not. Their defense mechanisms will hold out, and they will die of other causes."

The complete introduction from the book is here: abcnews.go.com/GMA/Books/ex...

Dr. Servan-Schreibner story is one that cuts to the heart of the matter, and is worth reading by anyone with any type of cancer. As usual, everyone will draw their own conclusions, based upon their individual confirmation bias and/or open-mindedness.

Again, Just my 2 cents. Be Well - cujoe

[pjoshea13 in reply to cujoe]

Cujoe,

There is the old belief that all men who live long enough will have evidence of PCa in their prostates. That this form of cancer is inevitable - regardless of diet. Sure, in most men PCa is indolent. Is that due to wise dietary choices? I don't know.

One could argue that PCa is a disease of affluence. Having the means to eat whatever we want 3 times a day, every day of the year, would seem like affluence to my ancestors, who had to cope with seasonal scarcity & periodic crop failures. The nutrients needed by healthy cells are also needed by PCa cells. When the supply is erratic, the body will limit growth by inhibiting IGF-I production. IGF-I is an important PCa growth factor. One reason we need to steer clear of dairy.

There are many studies that associate growth rates before adulthood with PCa. Tall men get more PCa and short men get less, than average height men. Children who experience prolonged growth spurts have higher risk. Young Dutch men are the tallest in Europe. It will be interesting to compare their PCa rates with the generation who were children during the German occupation, when food was scarce.

-Patrick

[cujoe in reply to pjoshea13]

Patrick,

Well, at 5' 9" the average height thing didn't work out too well for me. But with the zero defects result I got from the 120+ gene defect STRATA trial, maybe my PCa had something to do with my lousy adult diet & lifestyle? You Think?

And if diet is not THE major player in the development of PCa, then why do Asian men historically have one of the lowest incidences of prostate cancer (many of comfortable means, no doubt, and likely eating their traditional diets 3 times a day), all of a sudden have PCa rates comparable to American men within one generation of moving to the US? (Or for that matter adopting our western diet regardless of where they live.) While there are many critics of the research done by T. Colin Campbell and others in his book, The China Study, it clearly points a finger at diet and lifestyle as THE determinant of most diseases rampant in those eating our American diet. It is also worth pointing out that the widespread use of pesticides and chemical fertilizer for crops and the use if antibiotics and hormones in animals (that is the mainstay of industrialized agriculture) was not in use in China at that time. When coupled with the fact that population of China at the time of the study was genetically distinct (due to lack of large population in-migration), The China Study may represent the last best-case scenario for research on the links between diet/lifestyle and disease for large population groups we will ever have.

Rest assured, I'm not suggesting that anyone is going to CURE PCa by going on ANY diet. This is all about preventing the cancer we maybe didn't have to get in the first place. That may not sit well with those of us who feel that we coulda/shoulda/woulda have saved ourselves the pain and misery of this disease had we known earlier what we know now. But by getting the word out to our kids and grandchildren (and anyone else who will listen), maybe they will never have to spend time posting to a cancer blog like this one. (It's a very good one, BTW.)

My rambling/ranting 2 cents again. Be Well - cujoe

[pjoshea13 in reply to cujoe]

The interesting thing to me is that urologists in the UK do not mention PCa in textbooks written before 1850. One mid-century author spent 25 pages describing the prostate in minute detail. They had had access to cadavers & microscopes. BPH was described as an inevitable condition once men reached 50 & was much studied. The progression of BPH is quite different to PCa, of course, & surely the cancer would be recognized as such. By 1900, PCa was a recognized problem, although still not common.

Some years ago, I read through all of the urological books published before 1900 that were in GoogleBooks (a great resource). Yesterday, while in PubMed, I accidentally hit "First" & found myself back in the 1800's, reading reviews of some of those books. No mention of PCa in those early reviews.

Occassionally, we read of PCa found in ancient skeletons, & some use that to 'prove' that PCa has long been a problem, but I'm not convinced.

Here is one case:

sciencedirect.com/science/a...

-Patrick

[cujoe in reply to pjoshea13]

Patrick, Your acumen for research is uncanny. You bring to this forum food for thought* that broadens our exposure to information related to PCa and much, much more.

My goal is to progress from:

information > understanding > knowledge > truth.

Just a goal, not saying it is achievable with something as complex as PCa. (or diet) Be Well - cujoe

* While unintentional, but considering the dietary slant of these post, that's about as bad as some of Dr. Greger's puns and other attempts at humor.

[Magnus1964]

A lot of people ask if I was ever angry about getting Pca. I always tell them my rotten lifestyle was probably responsible. I lived on chard meat, McDonald's: a really bad diet all around. Plus I was a heavy drinker and smoker.

I guess I felt had no right to complain when cancer showed up. Since being diagnosed I became a vegetarian, stopped drinking and smoking and took some supplements to improve my chances. That was 26 years ago.

[Rogersw]

Thank you great list very useful. Just one thing my oncologist advised me to eat a few walnuts and grilled tomatoes daily. Any thoughts??

[CalBear74]

For those of you who are considering using curcumin, you may hold some misconceptions due to posts on this site concerning the liver and the bioavailability of curcumin. Here is a brief, but very useful video on this subject from nutritionfacts.org:

nutritionfacts.org/video/bo...

[Jollyjill]

Excellent recommendations which also based on my own research, are backed by sound scientific evidence. Husband managing metastatic PCa well swears by several of these regimens.

[j-o-h-n]

Don't forget the daily dose of chocolate chip ice cream (two scoops) - three if the wife's not looking.

Good Luck, Good Health and Good Humor.

j-o-h-n Tuesday 02/05/2019 7:50 PM EST

[Stegosaurus37]

Oh, crap. Not another "study" that I got prostate cancer because I didn't eat enough kale. I've never seen any rigorous study that implicated lifestyle factors. If there was one my wife would have been all over it like flies on a dead mule. If you want to be vegan, fine. But don't pretend that is "natural". Your binocular vision should show we're carnivores.

[Stegosaurus37]

I agree with you there - you need to be careful about where your food comes from.