Be prudent, not Western

A study shows that dietary choices of successfully treated patients can affect the recurrence of colon cancer

Colon-cancer survivors who eat a 'Western' diet high in red meat, fats and refined grains are more than three times as likely to have a recurrence as those who consume a 'prudent' diet high in fish, poultry, fruits and vegetables, researchers said recently.

Scientists already knew that avoiding a Western diet could reduce the risk of contracting colon cancer, but this is the first study associating the diet with a recurrence of the disease, Dr Jeffrey Meyerhardt and his colleagues at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston, US, reported in the Journal of the American Medical Association.

Such diets have not been linked to recurrence of any other type of cancer, with the possible exception of breast cancer.

Meyerhardt and his colleagues studied 1,109 patients with stage III colon cancer, which is localised to the large bowel area and the lymph nodes near the tumour.

All had received successful surgery and were participating in a trial that added chemotherapy. Their diets were assessed when they entered the trial and after six months too. The patients were studied for more than five years.

Diet findings
The team found that the 20 per cent of patients who had the most Westernised diet were 3.25 times as likely to have a recurrence as were the 20 per cent who had the most prudent diet.

The results, Meyerhardt said, "suggest that people treated for locally advanced colon cancer can actively improve their odds of survival by their dietary choices".

Meyerhardt and his colleagues speculated that a Western diet increased levels of insulin and insulin-like growth factors, which have been linked to the formation and growth of some types of tumours.