Cancer
Lowering dietary fat intake reduces prostate cancer risk
By Ben Wasserman
May 15, 2008 - 4:17:43 PM

THURSDAY May 15, 2008 (foodconsumer.org) -- A study by University of California, Los Angeles researchers suggested using a diet with low polyunsaturated fat may help prevent prostate cancer.

The study showed mice fed with a diet with only 12 percent of the calories coming from fat were 27 percent less likely to develop prostate cancer than those who ate a conventional Western-type diet, which typically contained 40 percent of calories from fat.

The fat used in the study was mostly from corn oil, which is made up of large amounts of oemga-6 fatty acids, the polyunsaturated fat commonly seen in Western diets.   

Some scientists believe that American eat way too much omega-6 fatty acids and way too little omega 3 fatty acids in addition to the fact that Americans use too much fat in their diets.

In the study published in the April 15 issue of the Cancer Research, the researchers also found that precancerous prostate cells grew much more slowly in mice fed the low-fat diet.

Early studies showed that a low fat, high-fiber diet is heart healthy and is known to reduce the risk of heart attacks and stroke.

The current study was meant to examine how a low fat diet affects the risk of prostate cancer, according to William Aronson and colleagues.

Aronson's lab performed research early and found that a low-fat diet slowed growth of aggressive human prostate cancer in mice and mice fed a low fat diet lived longer.

The researchers found mice eating the low fat diet had higher levels of a protein in the blood that binds to insulin and they believe this protein helped slow the growth of prostate cancer.