Does Diet Adjustment Impact Cancer Care?
How is cancer care impacted by diet adjustments? Oncology dietitian Dr. Cynthia Thomson from the University of Arizona discusses potential impacts of strategies for symptom management, immune response, nutrient deficiencies, inflammation, and diet patterns.
Related Resources:
Age-Informed Nutrition and Intervention Strategies for Cancer Patients Across All Ages |
Nutritional Essentials: Supporting Behavior Change During Cancer Treatment |
Transcript:
Lisa Hatfield:
How can adjusting your diet support you through your cancer journey? I’m excited to connect with a top expert to help us find the answers on this Patient Empowerment Network RESTORE program.
Dr. Thomson, what are the key components of nutrition that patients should be thinking during their cancer treatment?
Dr. Cynthia Thomson:
I think to start with, people need to think about what kind of symptoms they might be having during treatment and how can nutrition help them manage symptoms because I think symptom management is probably the most central nutritional issue in terms of making sure people can get through their cancer treatment in a timely manner that aligns with the prescription and optimizes their outcome after treatment. So I think managing those symptoms is one of the key components.
The second is to really do an assessment of what you’re eating and the quality of that diet. Are there nutrient deficiencies that need to be addressed and really honing in on specific nutrients or eating patterns that need to be evaluated and addressed. And then I think the third is really to move towards that long-term cancer survivorship eating plan. Where we’re really promoting a diet that’s more plant-based, a diet that is going to help reduce comorbidities, a diet that’s going to help you have the highest level of vigor and vitality after treatment. And so it’s kind of a continuum from symptom management, address those deficiencies and inadequacies in the diet, and then let’s go after optimization to reduce any risk of cancer recurrence as well as keep us healthy overall.
Lisa Hatfield:
Okay, thank you. And, Dr. Thomson, can you speak to the connection, if there is one, between the immune system and blood type and its impact on diet for cancer patients? And is this a consideration during care for you and your colleagues while supporting patients through their cancer journey?
Dr. Cynthia Thomson:
Yeah, so I do think there are a number of different, what we call fad diets, like the blood type diet, that are intriguing. Could our blood type actually dictate what diet we should be on and what diet is optimal for our health? I would say that there’s just a total lack of evidence for the blood type specifically. And so will research evolve in the future? I don’t know. I think right now we need a lot more preliminary evidence that this matters, and this is an important factor before we would move forward.
In terms of the immune system, I think this is where diet is critical, as well as physical activity. There is a lot of evidence that when we get active and when we eat certain foods, we can modulate how our immune system responds. And in fact, our immune system is the checkpoint, to make sure cancer does not develop in our bodies or that when it does develop, we can counter it.
I think it’s really important to think about what we eat and our physical activity to enhance our immune system. And I’ll give you, One of the more common examples is adequacy of vitamin C and making sure that we have adequate vitamin C for our immune system to respond. We also know that people who are deficient in vitamin D can have lower immune response. It can happen with other nutrients as well, but on the other side, we have things like inflammation, which is a hallmark of cancer. And so If we can select dietary components that are anti-inflammatory that reduce the inflammatory response within our bodies, then that also can help to modulate our cancer risk. So I think this connection between lifestyle behaviors and the immune system is critical. It is the primary mechanism by which these health behaviors protect us and keep us healthy.
Lisa Hatfield:
Okay, thank you. I do have a follow-up question. As a cancer patient myself, and I know you’re a cancer survivor also, so we hear a lot about different diets, the blood type diet we just talked about, and then things like the keto diet, eat more protein, eat less protein, eat plant-based, importance of the health of the gut microbiome. Is there any evidence that any one type of diet works better than another when it comes to not just cancer prevention, but maintaining where we’re at with our cancer, whether it’s curing it or maintaining, stabilizing the cancer when it’s not curable? Do you have any comments on that?
Dr. Cynthia Thomson:
Yeah, I mean, I think, first of all, there is a lack of randomized controlled trials, what we consider the gold standard, right? So, in terms of, can I say to you, we have 18 studies that say, the Mediterranean diet is the way to go. We don’t have that. What we do have is a lot of what we call epidemiological data.
So when we look at the diets of individuals who are either prior to their diagnosis of cancer, during their treatment, or after their treatment, we have increasing evidence that people who eat certain diet patterns, like a Mediterranean diet, like an anti-inflammatory diet, or score high on what we call the healthy eating index, where the quality of the diet is very plant-based, lower in fat, lower in processed foods, particularly processed meats. When those patterns are followed, we see better outcomes in terms of survival, but we also see that we can modulate certain inflammatory responses, oxidative stress, et cetera, that lead to cancer. So the mechanisms are there as well.
Lisa Hatfield:
Is there any evidence that there are cancer superfoods that might help stop the cancer or prevent cancer? I hear about blueberries being a superfood. Can you name any superfoods, or is there evidence to support that?
Dr. Cynthia Thomson:
Well, I think we all have our own superfoods, right? Broccoli, because it’s a cruciferous vegetable, or garlic and onion, which are known to enhance immune response against viral infections, or, on and on and on omega-3 fatty acids. And it could go on and on. So I always hate to say that any one food is going to prevent cancer. That is so unlikely. If there is one, it must be hidden somewhere. I just can’t imagine and so it really and increasingly we know this.
It’s a diet pattern, right? Like if you are, Lisa, putting blueberries on your cereal every morning, but that cereal is Cap’n Crunch or some other sugared cereal versus something that’s higher in fiber, like steel-cut oats or, you know. So I feel like we cannot look at foods in isolation because while one food may have a beneficial effect, we can easily counter that by making other choices that are not so healthy. And so we can eat this anti-inflammatory food and then counter it with a pro-inflammatory food. So it’s really the pattern of eating that we need to think about.
Lisa Hatfield:
Okay, thank you. You heard it here directly from the expert. Thanks for joining this RESTORE program. I’m your host, Lisa Hatfield.
