Food supplements including multivitamins and minerals are popularly sold online. Believing the claims of these supplements, unsuspecting cancer patients consume them like magic pills only to end up frustrated when their expectations aren’t fulfilled.

When it comes to cancer prevention, the best is still a diet rich in fruits and vegetables. As I have discussed in an earlier blog, vegetables eaten along with anti-cancer medications proved to be very beneficial in the fight against cancer. But, Vitamin B12, folic acid, even Vitamin A, carotene and Vitamin E proved to be harmful for cancer patients when taken in concentrated and capsule form. more…

The answer is quite simple, it’s now. Most women start to get concerned about a healthy diet when they are diagnosed with breast cancer. Women are not alone in their new eating habits. As the link between diet and cancer becomes clearer, and studies show some links between certain foods and prevention of cancer, people are increasingly looking to nutrition as a way to prevent or even survive cancer. more…

Canto, left, a 27-year-old rhesus monkey, is on a restricted diet, while Owen, 29, is not. The two monkeys are part of a study of the links between diet and aging.

New Studies on monkeys

The NewYork times reported recently that Richard Weindruch’s team for the University of Wisconsin published an ongoing study in the journal Science, showed an increase in life quality for the group that followed the diet than the group who ate the quantity they wanted. The studies had been going since 20 years and should wait till all the monkeys are dead to confirm the conclusion on cancer protection. The study was published midway as the results even now give a clear indication on the difference between the two groups under the study: one with restrictive diet and the other without.  more…

Being at war against cancer, demands to be fit for the task. It’s not about a slim diet, but being smart in what we put in our mouth. Experts agree that people with a BMI between 21 and 23 are in the comfort zone. The reason is quite simple, increase in weight means more body fat which produce cytokine hormone that increase our general state of inflammation. Inflammation is a key process that prostate cancer use to grow. more…

The prevention of breast cancer, like in all cancers starts with a healthy diet. There are not super foods that you could eat and get healthy, it is the combination of a diet rich in fruits and vegetables with whole grain bread or pasta. However, there are functional foods that will prevent cancer if consumed on a regular basis like everyday. Two of these functional foods are mushrooms and green tea.

Cancer research

In the International Journal of Cancer, a team of cancer researchers from the University of Western Australia in Perth showed that their consumption can lower the risk of breast cancer about 80-90% compared to the women who do not consumed either. Interestingly, these two foods are a common part of the traditional Chinese diet where breast cancer is 5 times less frequent than Western countries. See more details about this research published by Reuters.

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A recent article was published on the top cancer fighting foods which give additional munitions in the war against cancer. By using functional foods everyday in an appreciated amount, you increase your chance to avoid cancer. Not only the method seems effective but also cheaper and a lot less painful then chemotherapy, surgery and radiotherapy. Sure, functional foods do not replace modern medicine but a healthy diet now can save you from an unpleasant diagnosis later at an oncologist near you .
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Some doctors are starting to get back to the basics of medicine. Hippocrates, the father of medicine, wrote two thousand and five hundred years ago to “Let your food be your medicine and let your medicine be your food”.  Surely, it’s not about throwing away the last century of medical advance, but using a balance with the pills the modern medicine brought and the chicken soup of granny. Again it’s not a debate on ethics, but the use of common sense with all the scientific knowledge available today.

After all, food is the one medicine that we seemingly willing to swallow at least three times a day. Why not make it count, and add up the tasty dishes made with inexpensive ingredients from the local market to help upgrade our general conditions.
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In a previous blog post I have introduced three important foods to fight breast cancer : small berries, salmon and green leaf. Here is the next four key foods:

Whole Grains

You can get brown rice, whole wheat, barley and oatmeal to name a few. By buying refined white bread or white rice, you miss out all the phytochemicals important to fight breast cancer. Actually these refined products are mainly the sugar that cancer feed on. You can test it by leaving a piece of white bread in your mouth for a minute and you will taste the sugar. Try to replace your pasta, bread or tortillas for whole grain ones.
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Breast cancer research

Cancer researchers recently demonstrated that regular intake of foods including trans fats could also significantly increase the risk of breast cancer, in addition to their multiple harmful effects. In this study which lasted 7 years, the scientists measured the blood concentration of trans fats in 19,934 women aged 56 on average, and studied the association between these levels and the onset of breast cancer. The results were dramatic. The women who consumed the most trans fats and therefore had larger concentrations in their blood ran twice the risk of getting breast cancer than those who had the lowest blood concentrations. In the light of these results, there is no doubt that a decrease in dietary trans fat intake could have very beneficial impacts in preventing this terrible disease.

Avoiding trans fats is made even more desirable when you think that these foods in general also include astronomical concentrations of sugar and/or fat, therefore calories and contribute to obesity leading to chronical inflammation, while being completely devoid of essential nutrients such as fibres, vitamins and phytochemical compounds that could prevent the apparition of breast cancer.

What can you do?

Besides eating less processed food, you can take control and use functional foods which are weapons that help you fight cancer. By taking here of, 5 to 10 functional foods everyday, people should get plenty of phytochemicals. By replacing trans fat filled fast foods with functional foods, we help fight our way out of cancer.

Reference

Dietary fat and weight gain among women in the Nurses’ Health Study.
Field AE, Willett WC, Lissner L, Colditz GA.
Obesity (Silver Spring). 2007 Apr;15(4):967-76

4 years ago, the Harvard medical school recommended that routinely eating nutritious meal and munching healthy snack give less worries about Friday 5 to 7 burger and fries. This daily meal gives you latitude on your risk to die from breast cancer.

You increase your odds to live a longer and healthier life despite occasional chips, cake and pop soda. The important thing is what you take everyday and when an occasional treat becomes your three o’clock, you are really reducing your option.

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