Eating a diet loaded with fruits and vegetables and low in fat did not reduce breast cancer recurrence or death in early stage breast cancer survivors in a new study done by researchers at the Rebecca and John Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego.
This study is the largest randomized trial ever done to gather information about the influence of diet on breast cancer activity. “It’s been praised as one of the better studies. We got everything,” John Pierce, Ph.D., director of the University’s Cancer Prevention and Control Program told Ivanhoe.
The study looked at 3,088 breast cancer survivors who were divided into two randomly assigned diet groups for six to 11 years. One group followed an intensified diet, which after the first year included increasing their vegetable and fruit intake to an average of 12 servings per day, lowering their fat intake by 13 percent, and increasing their daily fiber. The other group followed a standard recommended healthy diet, which included five vegetable servings, 16 ounces of vegetable juice, three servings of fruit, 30 grams of fiber, and 15 percent to 20 percent fat intake. At the end of the study, and after seven years of follow up, researchers found no difference in recurrence or survival between groups. “It was very surprising to everybody because we always get some difference, and to make such a huge change in your dietary pattern and get no difference — it’s just amazing,” said Dr. Pierce.
The research team emphasized that these results apply to the typical woman in the study. Dr. Pierce said further research would be necessary to determine if an intensified diet can benefit certain breast cancer survivors. “We think there’s possibly a sub group of women who would benefit from this high dietary pattern We’re going to be looking at that.”
SOURCE: Ivanhoe Interview with John Pierce, Ph.D., The Journal of the American Medical Association, 2007;298:289-298