Study: Western Diet Increases Prostate Cancer-Related Mortality

Adhering to a Western diet rich in red and processed meats as well as refined grains and high-fat dairy products could raise prostate cancer patients’ risk for both prostate cancer- and all-cause related death, according to a new study.

A team led by Meng Yang, PhD, MPH, a research fellow at the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health analyzed the diets of 926 men who had been diagnosed with prostate cancer, evaluating the patients for an average of 14 years after their diagnosis. Data for the study was obtained from the Physicians’ Health Study I and II; trials of male physicians between the ages of 40 and 84. The authors sent food-frequency questionnaires to participants in order to collect information on their diets.
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In addition, patients were put into groups based on whether they followed a Western diet or a more “prudent” diet consisting of more fruit, vegetables, fish, legumes, and whole grains, for example. Throughout the follow-up period, 333 participants died. Among them, 56 of those deaths, or 17%, were attributed to prostate cancer.

Yang and colleagues found those who stuck to a mostly Western diet were 2.5 times more likely to succumb to prostate cancer. These patients also demonstrated a 67% higher risk of all-cause mortality compared to those in the lowest quartile, i.e., those adhering to a more cautious diet. These patients following a more careful diet also had a 36% lower risk of all-cause mortality.

Yang notes that 1 out of 7 men will be diagnosed with prostate cancer, adding that prostate cancer patients typically have a long life expectancy.

“However,” says Yang, “the information [that is available] about how these men manage their lifestyles—like diet—to decrease the risk of death is very little.”

This study “provides a general dietary guideline after diagnosis for these patients and their primary care practitioners,” continues Yang, adding that a more Westernized diet may increase mortality risk, while a prudent diet “may increase the survivorship of [these] patients.”

For primary care physicians, the results “suggest that the same dietary recommendations that are made to the general population, primarily for the prevention of cardiovascular disease, may also decrease disease-specific and all-cause mortality among men initially diagnosed with non-metastatic prostate cancer.

—Mark McGraw

Reference
Yang M, Kenfield S, et al. Dietary Patterns after Prostate Cancer Diagnosis in Relation to Disease-Specific and Total Mortality. Cancer Prevention Research. 2015.