Change in diet can slow cancer growth | A Study

A study has suggested that eating a low-carbohydrate, high-protein diet may reduce the risk of cancer and slow the growth of tumors already present. The study has been published in Cancer Research, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research

The study was conducted in mice, but it will be effective on humans says the scientists involved in the study.

"This shows that something as simple as a change in diet can have an impact on cancer risk," said lead researcher Gerald Krystal, a distinguished scientist at the British Columbia Cancer Research Centre.

Krystal and his colleagues implanted various strains of mice with human tumor cells or with mouse tumor cells and assigned them to one of two diets. The first diet, a typical Western diet, contained about 55 per cent carbohydrate, 23 per cent protein and 22 per cent fat.

The second, which was somewhat like a South Beach diet but higher in protein, contained 15 per cent carbohydrate, 58 per cent protein and 26 per cent fat. They found that the tumor cells grew consistently slower on the second diet.

As well, mice genetically predisposed to breast cancer were put on these two diets and almost half of them on the Western diet developed breast cancer within their first year of life while none on the low-carbohydrate, high-protein diet did.