Genes are responsible for the expression of our health conditions. Health conscious people, like ourselves are so interested to know the diseases that they may have inherited from their ancestors. Certainly, forewarned is being forearmed. But, be obsessed and anxious, to think that once they have the gene for a certain disease, they are destined to suffer and die as their relatives did. Maybe by inaction! But when I reviewed recent studies, this shouldn’t really be your scenario. I really think that if you have a gene for a certain chronic illness you can prevent its full blown expression. more…

Most of us think that all fruits and vegetables are created equal. To ascertain this, I did some research and surprisingly, I discovered that highly colored fruits and vegetables are more saturated with phytochemicals. As we all know, phytochemicals are highly effective in preventing chronic illnesses and prostate cancer.
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Middle aged men have a lot of concern about their prostate. They complain of symptoms of prostate trouble like difficulty in urinating or recurrent urinary tract infections. When this happens, they start thinking, “Is it prostate cancer, or is it just a benign case of hypertrophy of the prostate?” Don’t panic, see things objectively and cooperate with your doctor.

Prostate enlargement usually begins around 50 years of age. If prostate cancer has put its influence in your life there is a lot you can do. 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…

This is the perfect example of the opposite of processed Food. In complete food, the texture and the envelope of the food is there.In processed food or refined food the peel or skin is dissolved or ground to get rid of it. This action takes out most of the vitamins, minerals and phytochemicals that we need as weapons to fight prostate cancer.

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Rule #3 As For Supplement, Take vitamin D and forget the rest

There is an easy way to acquire vitamin D: just expose yourself to sun for 10 minutes/day and your body will produce naturally the right amount of vitamin D you need. To have the maximum effect expose your whole body unprotected (you can keep your bathing suit though). Unfortunately with all the ads on skin cancer, the general population are starting to miss off that essential vitamin.

Supplements are for deficiency

The doctor prescribed your vitamin or essential elements for your deficiency should be the major case to take supplement. The only essential element missing in Western diet is vitamin D. If you follow the American Dietary Guidelines, you should be fine in 99.99% of the cases. A 1000 UI a day should be plenty.
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Soy comes in many shapes and many formats. From soymilk to tofu, passing as meat substitute to frozen treats, the promotion of a healthy diet help man to protect him against prostate cancer.

The neutral tasting functional food for real men

What is great with soy is that it will take the taste of whatever you mix or cook it with. The possibilities are endless. It can be in sauces, dips, smoothies, soups, stuffings, you name it. It can always be used as a side dish or mixed in your burger. more…

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Rule #2

The next recommendation from the World Cancer Research Fund is to avoid soft drink.

The Facts

A small can of Coke, Pepsi or pop can has the equivalent of 9 tsp of sugar. We have about 6L of blood in our body. In all that blood we need only about a teaspoon of sugar in healthy people. So make the maths, you get in 5 minutes, 9 times the amount your blood stream can take. And the worst part is your more thirsty after that than before you drank the soft drink because it actually steals the water from you. Furthermore, all this sugar sends a message to your brain and brain tells you to turn it into fat. So diet soft drinks even if they do not have actual sugar send the same message and your body will turn sugar into fat with other food sources never the less.

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I will comment on each of the 9 recommendations given by World Cancer Fund foundation which up came with this conclusion by the world experts on the manner.

Rule #1: 30 minutes of exercise everyday

It’s doesn’t look much, but research start to pick up on the subject. A cancer research made at University of Kentucky published in the Prostate journal done on an animal model which is prone to develop prostate cancer after some time, showed that 3 miles run every day for human, decrease the apparition of the disease. Furthermore, Cancer institutes like the Dana-Fraber are also interested in the beneficial effect of physical exercises. more…

From the data of 20 studies, men who ate a diet rich in tomato had a 20 % reduced risk of prostate cancer. Somehow, the process of heating and cooking this fruit, yes by definition tomato is a fruit and not vegetable, increase the effectiveness of its phytochemicals. Raw tomatoes are only half effective than the cooked ones.

How it works?

Cancer research has shown that tomatoes reduced inflammation which is one of the 4 basic processes that prostate cancer use to take control of you. Sure tomatoes alone can’t be a cure, but by addition of other functional foods you increase your chance by the mouthful.

Can a supplement of lycopene work?

Nope. A phase II study on advanced prostate cancer concluded no benefit. The results were published in the Journal of Urology by a team from Witten/Herdecke University in Germany. I am not surprised from the results since lycopene is just one of the phytochemicals of the tomato. A lot of supplements fail to provide the same benefit of the functional food from which it has been extracted. Anyway, supplements are good only if you miss a nutrient. And the only nutrient we miss is vitamin D, but that’s another story.

Bottom line

Eat tomato, cook them and use a little extra virgin olive oil. You can go hardcore and take 2 spoonfuls of tomato paste everyday like a medicine but I prefer to make a salsa with them.

Reference

Lycopene for advanced hormone refractory prostate cancer: a prospective, open phase II pilot study.Schwenke C, Ubrig B, Thürmann P, Eggersmann C, Roth S. J Urol. 2009 Mar;181(3):1098-103.