A long study of about 80,000 people shows that herbal diet offers wide cancer protection, with benefits that extend from the digestive tract to hormone -related cancers, without increasing the risk of any type.
Study: The longitudinal correlations between the vegetarian dietary habits and the cancer-specific site in the North America Adventist Health-2 study. Credit Picture: Adri Yadam Nasir / Shutterstock
A recent study at The American Nutrition Journal Investigated the correlations between different types of vegetarian diet and the risk of cancer in different physical spaces.
Diet and cancer
A vegetarian diet is a dietary pattern that generally focuses on the highest intake of vegetables, fruits, fruits and legumes, while restricting or blocking meat. On the contrary, the western diet is characterized by high intake of refined granules, processed foods, red meat and sugary drinks.
High intake of fruits and vegetables leads to increased exposure to plant manufacturers with anti -cancer effects. In addition, excluding meat intake in a vegetarian diet reduces the risk of obesity, which has been linked to many types of cancer. Although the association between vegetarian eating habits and cancers in various physical areas remained controversial, few strong bonds were created. For example, both processed and unprocessed red meat consumption has been linked to an increased risk of colon cancer.
Previous publications by the group behind this study showed a protective correlation between a vegetarian diet and common cancers, such as colon, breast and prostate. However, more studies are needed to connect a vegetarian diet with less common types of cancer.
For the study
The current study examined the Adventist Health Study-2 (AHS-2) team to investigate the correlation between a vegetarian dietary pattern and less common cancers. This study focuses on building knowledge of the benefits of vegetarian diet in a wider range of cancer types.
The AHS-2 team recruited participants from the United States and Canada between 2002 and 2007. Of the 95,863 participants, about 26,000 were black, which allowed scientists to focus on this group of minorities. The participants were examined on the basis of the eligibility criteria and the availability of full data related to this study.
All participants completed a comprehensive questionnaire about their dietary standards and were divided into different groups based on their answers. Participants were commissioned to one of the following groups: vegans, lacquer-oo-grass, pesco-vegetarians, semi-grass or non-vegetarians.
Participants who avoided all animal products were included in the Vegan group, while those who avoided all flesh foods (meat or fish) but consumed eggs and dairy products were assigned to the Lacto -vo-Vegetarive team. Similarly, Pesco-Vegetarians were defined as a lacquer-ootogy who also consumed fish at least once a month, while semi-grass eating non-fish foods rarely (at least once a month, but less than once a week).
The authors corresponded to the AHS-2 data in all United States Cancer Registers, except for Maine and three Canadian provincial registries to identify new cancer diagnoses. For each area of cancer, the participants were layered for age, gender, education and past and present cancer control habits.
Study findings
A total of 79,468 participants met the eligibility criteria, including 26% black and 65% female participants. The current study allowed an average of 7.9 years of follow -up per participant. The method of marginal standardization was used to compare vegetarians with non -vegetarian participants, after adaptation for age, sex and race.
In addition to the family history of breast cancer, the study attended significant differences within the groups. For example, a higher proportion of vegetarians were older, less likely to use contraceptives, were less likely to undergo replacement of postmenopausal hormone, breastfeeding infants a little more and were more educated.
The current study showed differences between vegetarians and non -vegetarians were close to zero or favored vegetarians for all types of cancer, except perhaps myeloma. Compared to the adventist’s non -vegetarians, all vegetarian diets have been associated with reduced risk of both total (risk ratio [HR]: 0.88) and medium frequency cancers (HR: 0.82).
The authors noted that the adjustment for the Body Mass Index (BMI) slightly weakened these protective compounds, suggesting that the lower body weight between the vegetarians was partially mediated. It is noteworthy that even non -vegetarian adventists in the study are a health consciousness group, consuming fewer meats and alcohol than the general population, which may mean that the protective effects of vegetarian diets could be even more intense than a formal diet.
Different vegetarian diets have been shown to affect independent specific types of cancer. For example, a Vegan diet was associated with a lower incidence of breast and prostate cancer at younger ages, although the protective compound for prostate cancer was not observed in elderly men. PESCO-VEGETARIANS runs a lower risk of colon cancer (a finding also important for all vegetarians, HR: 0.79) and breast cancer at older ages.
A significantly lower risk for lymphopolis cancers (including lymphomas) was observed in vegetarians (HR: 0.75), with lact-oo-grass and, in certain age groups, vegans that have a lower risk.
The risk of stomach cancer was significantly lower among all vegetarians in combination (HR: 0.55), with the paper noting that this was also observed in pit-oh-octopuses. Some of these findings related to specific locations were based on relatively small numbers and must be carefully interpreted. Further research is needed to determine if a vegetarian diet affects the risk of pancreatic, lungs and ovarian cancers.
Conclusions
The current study underlined the benefits of a vegetarian diet to reduce the risk of many cancers. No evidence has shown that a vegetarian dietary standard increases the risk of any cancer.
The authors mentioned several restrictions on the current study. For example, a relatively small number of less common cancers could be linked to vegans and pesco-vegetarians. The authors also noted that nutritional information was collected only at the beginning of the study and not during the follow -up period. Future studies must interpret the findings of the current study, taking into account the particular racial mixture of the AHS-2 cog.
