A new research has found that men with prostate cancer who ate a low-fat diet and took fish oil supplements had lower levels of pro-inflammatory substances in their blood and a lower cell cycle progression score, than men who ate a typical Western diet.
According to lead author William Aronson from UCLA, the findings are important because lowering the cell cycle progression (CCP) score, a measure used to predict cancer recurrence, may help prevent prostate cancers from becoming more aggressive.
"We found that CCP scores were significantly lower in the prostate cancer in men who consumed the low-fat fish oil diet as compare to men who followed a higher fat Western diet," William Aronson said.
"We also found that men on the low-fat fish oil diet had reduced blood levels of pro-inflammatory substances that have been associated with cancer," he said.
That short-term study also found that the men on the low-fat fish oil diet were able to change the composition of their cell membranes in both the healthy cells and the cancer cells in the prostate.
They had increased levels of omega-3 fatty acids from fish oil and decreased levels of the more pro-inflammatory omega-6 fatty acids from corn oil in the cell membranes, which may directly affect the biology of the cells, Aronson said.
The study is published in the journal Cancer Prevention Research.