Diet, Nutrition, and Prostate Cancer

Abstract

Cancer of the prostate gland is one of the most common malignancies in affluent nations, in part due to the application of new screening and diagnostic tools. The development of life-threatening prostate cancer is the culmination of a complex series of initiation and promotional events over a period of decades and under the influence of many interacting genetic and environmental factors. A rapidly accumulating scientific literature provides compelling evidence for the hypothesis that diet and nutrition are important factors modifying risk of prostate cancer. Additional resources devoted to interactive research efforts by laboratory scientists and epidemiologists will provide further enlightenment and continued refinement of our assessment of risks and benefits for specific nutrients and dietary patterns. These studies provide hope that evidence-based dietary interventions will significantly impact the risk of prostate cancer and enhance the efficacy of therapeutic interventions.

Incidence and mortality of testicular and prostatic cancers in relation to world dietary practices

“…[23][24][25][26][27][28][29] According to a recent review article by Kolonel et al, 30 however, although early epidemiologic studies implicated dietary fat as a likely causal factor for this cancer, scientific support for such an association has [31][32][33][34][35][36] Soya is a major source of the isoflavonoids, daidzein and genistein. 33 According to Griffiths et al, 34 a Japanese male consumes approximately 20 mg of isoflavones per day, whereas Western men consume less than 1 mg/day.…”

Dietary patterns and risk of prostate cancer in Ontario, Canada

“…6,7 The role of diet has been investigated in several epidemiologic studies, including dietary fat intake, vitamin A, carotenoids, fruits, vegetables, dairy products and soy products. 2,3,[7][8][9][10][11][12][13][14][15][16] The most consistent dietary component associated with prostate cancer risk is fat intake, 2 an association that is apparent despite differences in the quality of the study methods and assessment of dietary intake. [2][3][4]7,8,16 Recent attention has turned to a group of phytochemicals, particularly the isoflavones found in soybeans, 10,15 since Asians, with lower prostate cancer rates, have high consumption of soy products.…”

New Developments in Lycopene Analysis by Spectroscopic and Chromatographic Techniques, Accompanied With Mathematical Modelling

“…Due to its lipidic nature, breast milk is a good vehicle for lycopene, solubilized in the lipid fraction, providing for lycopene intake for breastfed children. In general, lycopene is found in human milk at approximately 3.8 mg/100 g, or 10% of the serum concentrations [29,36], although a low correlation has been found between the amount of lycopene in the diet of tested mothers and concentrations in breast milk.…”

“…Koonsvitsky et al [28] reported a reduction of nearly 30% over 16 weeks in patients consuming Olestra together with lycopene, and the presence of very high levels of phytosterols in some functional foods, which have been demonstrated to reduce carotenoid absorption. Thus, consumption of lycopene and this kind of products should be separated by several hours [29,30].…”

“…Variations may be influenced by factors such as ingestion of alcohol or smoking [29,31,32]. The maximum levels of lycopene in serum are found to be at 6 h after its ingestion with an average half-life of 12-20 h [24,33].…”