Want to Avoid Prostate Cancer? Normalize Your Weight

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Want to Avoid Prostate Cancer? Normalize Your Weight

Urology November 2001;58:723-728

Higher rates of obesity may help to explain why black men tend to have more

advanced prostate cancer at younger ages than men of other ethnic groups.

Black men are known to have higher rates of prostate cancer and higher

mortality rates from prostate cancer than whites and Asians. Whether genes

or environmental factors such as dietary fat and excess body weight are

responsible, however, is not clear.

Researchers reviewed medical data from 860 patients with advanced prostate

cancer and found 21% of the men were obese and 49% were overweight.

Obese patients were more likely to have undergone radical prostatectomy at

a younger average age, to have an elevated Gleason score -- a method used

to classify the aggressiveness of prostate cancer -- and to have had their

cancer spread to other organs.

Blacks, who had the highest average body mass index compared to whites and

Asians, also had the most advanced cancers. Body mass index is a

measurement of weight in relation to height.

Body fat is thought to serve as a reservoir for male hormones and proteins

that may promote the growth of tumors. Excess body fat can also inhibit

certain immune system cells that normally prevent tumors from progressing.

Urology November 2001;58:723-728

http://www.mercola.com/2001/dec/29/prostate_cancer.htm