This is the best diet that can be followed against the most common cancer

Related news

The health of our body depends, in large part, on what we consume. Researchers MD Anderson Cancer Center of the University of Texas, in the United States now publish in Science a study on the relationship between diet and one of the most common cancers: melanoma.

In their study, they found that melanoma patients who reported eating more fiber-rich foods when they started immunotherapy treatment survived longer without their cancer growing than those with insufficient dietary fiber intake.

The benefit was most notable in patients who did not take commercially available probiotic supplements. Furthermore, parallel preclinical studies supported the observational results.

"Research by our team and others has shown that gut microbes influence response to immunotherapy treatment, but the role of diet and probiotic supplementation has not been well studied," explains co-author Jennifer Wargo, Ph.D. medicine and surgical oncology.

"Our study sheds light on the potential effects of a patient's diet and supplement use when starting treatment with immune checkpoint blockade," adds Wargo. Furthermore, "these results provide further support for clinical trials to modulate the microbiome with the goal of improving cancer outcomes using dietary and other strategies."

Patients who reported eating more fruits, vegetables, legumes, and whole grains met the study's threshold for sufficient fiber intake. The 37 patients with sufficient fiber intake had better progression-free survival (median not reached) compared to the 91 patients with insufficient fiber intake (median 13 months). Each five-gram increase in daily fiber intake was associated with a 30% lower risk of cancer progression or death.

When patients were further grouped according to high or low fiber diet and use of commercially available probiotic supplements, a response to immunotherapy was seen in 18 of 22 patients (82%) who reported sufficient fiber intake and did not use probiotics, compared to the response seen in 60 of 101 (59%) patients who reported insufficient fiber intake or use of probiotics. Response was defined as complete or partial tumor shrinkage or stable disease for at least six months. Probiotic use alone was not associated with a significant difference in progression-free survival or the odds of response to immunotherapy.

"Dietary fiber is important for gut health, just as it is for overall health, and the two things are closely intertwined," said co-author Carrie Daniel-MacDougall, associate professor of epidemiology.

Dev confession of the day: @IrisClasson I just had to google how to clear an array in js... 🙃 #javascript #webdev #nodejs

— Ben Weber Sun May 26 12:20:14 +0000 2019

"In this study we saw that dietary fiber may also be important for cancer treatment, which brings us to a point where we can design intervention studies to answer the questions that patients really want answered: Does it matter? what I eat now and could affect the outcome of my treatment? We are united in working to find answers for our patients," he says.

A study of gut microbiomes

The study began by analyzing the gut microbiome profiles of 438 melanoma patients, 321 of whom had advanced-stage disease and were treated with systemic therapy, and 293 had an evaluable response to treatment during follow-up.

Most of these patients (87%) received an immune checkpoint blockade, mostly PD-1 inhibitors. A total of 158 patients also completed a lifestyle survey regarding the use of antibiotics and probiotics; of these, 128 completed a dietary questionnaire upon starting immune checkpoint therapy.

The research team reinforced their previous findings, which showed an increased abundance of Ruminococcaceae and Faecalibacterium prausnitzii - well-known and potentially beneficial bacteria involved in fiber or starch digestion - in patients who responded to immunotherapy. In contrast to previous results, the overall diversity of gut bacteria was not associated with response to immunotherapy, which could be due to the larger size of this patient cohort.

They also tested diets with higher or lower fiber content and the use of probiotics in various preclinical models of melanoma to shed light on possible mechanisms underlying observational findings from patient cohorts.

In several models, the use of probiotics was associated with reduced response to immune checkpoint blockade, larger tumors, less diversity of the gut microbiome, and fewer cytotoxic T cells in the tumor microenvironment. A high-fiber diet was associated with slower tumor growth and a significantly higher frequency of CD4+ T cells in preclinical models treated with PD-1 inhibitors.

The clinical trial will be based on the results and will test the effect of the dietary intervention. Building on early study results, a randomized clinical trial (NCT04645680), led by co-author Jennifer McQuade, MD, Associate Professor of Melanoma Medical Oncology, will examine how diets based on whole foods with varying fiber content affect the microbiome and the immune response. The study is currently enrolling patients with stage III-IV melanoma who are receiving immunotherapy.

"Our research teams within the Program for Innovative Research in the Microbiome and Translation (PRIME-TR) and the MD Anderson Bionutrition Research Core are working collectively to transform cancer therapy by modifying the microbiome," said Wargo. .

"We are grateful to the patients and families who have participated in our research and hope that this work will ultimately provide evidence-based guidance to help patients take control of their own diets to improve their chances." against cancer," he concludes.

Follow the topics that interest you