Cancer Decisions - WELLBEING Free Newsletter

HERE AT THE MOSS REPORTS

Constantly monitoring the scientific literature pertaining to the prevention and treatment of cancer is an essential part of my work. By keeping a watchful eye on the medical journals I am able to discern emerging research concepts and pass along to my readers the latest developments. It also enables me to keep the library of Moss Reports on more than 200 different cancer diagnoses updated.

Each Moss Report is an even-handed and thorough analysis of the available conventional and alternative treatments for a particular kind of cancer. The reports also discuss such topics as participation in clinical trials, how to change one's diet in order to maximize one's chances of recovery, and how to detect and avoid unsafe and unsound remedies.

If you would like to order a Moss Report for yourself or someone you love, you can do so from our website, www.cancerdecisions.com, or by calling 1-800-980-1234 (814-238-3367 from outside the US).

Also downloadable from our website are our Current Topics reports on important cancer-related subjects. These reports are priced at $9.95 each.

Choose from the following:

Do Antioxidants and Chemotherapy Conflict?
Mammography, Biopsy and the Diagnosis of Breast Cancer
Herceptin – or Deceptin? (An evaluation of the use of Herceptin in breast cancer)
Avastin – Your Money or Your Life (A clear-eyed look at the 'targeted' drug Avastin)
The Politics of Hope: Andrew von Eschenbach and the Decline of the National Cancer Institute
The Mexican Cancer Clinics in the Era of Evidence-Based Medicine

I am also available for phone consultations with those clients who have purchased a Moss Report. A recent phone consultation client wrote:

"I've used the Moss Report on Breast Cancer to direct my successful ten-year battle with the disease, and I've appreciated the thorough research and unbiased opinions that Dr. Moss provides. Since I am once again in a position that I must seek further treatment, I chose to have a phone consultation with Dr. Moss. I had been considering a treatment option that Dr. Moss felt very strongly would not be of benefit to me. Through our conversation I not only gained information that will keep me from wasting $20,000 on a treatment with no merit, but Dr. Moss also gave me some ideas that cause me to remain very hopeful." — JM

To schedule a phone consultation, please call 1-800-980-1234 (814-238-3367 from outside the US) or send an email to Jacquie@cancerdecisions.com.

We look forward to helping you.

FATTY FISH SHOWN TO PREVENT KIDNEY CANCER

In a surprising finding, Swedish scientists have discovered that eating salmon, herring or other kinds of fatty or oily fish just a few times per month significantly helps prevent kidney (renal) cancer. An estimated 38,890 Americans will be diagnosed with this type of cancer in 2006, and 12,840 will die of it.

Here is how this unusual study came about. In the late 1980s, 90,000 Swedish women were questioned about their dietary habits. More than a decade later the women were interviewed again about their health status. Scientists at Sweden's famed Karolinska Institute (home of most of the Nobel prize committees) found that those women who ate fatty fish gained significant protection against cancer of the kidneys.

Women who consumed at least one portion of fatty fish each week during the study period (1987-2004) reduced their risk of renal cancer by an astonishing 74 per cent compared to those who reported that they never ate fatty fish. However, it is important to note that there was no such benefit from consuming lean, non-fatty or white-fleshed fish, including most shellfish.

"This is the first time that a link between the consumption of fatty fish and renal cancer has been studied," said Prof. Alicja Wolk, the paper's first author. The presence of fish oil turned out to be crucial. "The reason previous studies have been unable to demonstrate a link between fish consumption and renal cancer is that they made no distinction between fatty and non-fatty fish," she added. It is not known if a similar protective effect would be seen in men or for other types of cancer in either sex.

Why is there such a huge difference in the health benefits of fatty vs. non-fatty fish? The reason seems to be that oily fish contains up to 30 times more omega-3 fatty acids and three to five times more vitamin D than lean fish. Earlier laboratory studies have shown that omega 3 fatty acids protect against a variety of cancers. As we discussed in last week's issue of our Wellbeing newsletter, vitamin D also is strongly protective against pancreatic cancer.

To read last week's newsletter please click or go to:
http://www.cancerdecisions.com/110506.html

Which are the fatty fish? This Scandinavian study included salmon, raw (pickled) herring, sardines, and mackerel. Non-fatty fish included tuna, cod, and many others. But be aware that the fat content of food fish varies, even within broad categories.

Information on the fat content of fish can be obtained from various sources, such as the US Department of Agriculture Web site (www.usda.gov), which allows you to see a nutritional breakdown for all commonly consumed foods.

This database provides much valuable information. We learn that 100 grams (i.e., almost 4 ounces) of these common types of seafood on average contain the following amounts of total lipids (or fats), listed in an ascending order of oiliness:

• Lobster, northern, cooked, moist heat...0.59 grams of fat
• Tuna, light, canned in water, drained solids...0.82 grams of fat
• Haddock, cooked, dry heat...0.93 grams of fat
• Shrimp, mixed species, cooked, moist heat...1.08 grams of fat

In other words, the above are poor choices when it comes to kidney cancer prevention. Better choices would be:

• Bluefish, cooked, dry heat...5.44 grams per fat
• Salmon, sockeye, canned, drained solids with bone...7.31 grams of fat
• Catfish, channel, farmed, cooked, dry heat...8.02 grams of fat
• Salmon, Atlantic, wild, cooked, dry heat...8.13 grams of fat (rarely available)
• Tuna, light, canned in oil, drained solids...8.21 grams of fat
• Anchovies, European, canned in oil, drained solids...9.71 grams of fat
• Sardine, Pacific, canned in tomato sauce, drained solids with bone...10.46 grams of fat
• Sardine, Atlantic, canned in oil, drained solids with bone...11.45 grams of fat
• Salmon, Atlantic, farmed, cooked, dry heat...12.35 grams of fat
• Mackerel, Atlantic, cooked, dry heat...17.81 grams of fat

Note that tuna that is canned in oil contains far more lipids/fats than tuna that is canned in water. But much of the total fat content is simply the vegetable oil used in the canning process, which also probably absorbs most of the scant omega-3s contained in the original fish. And since this oil is often discarded before serving, the omega-3s are likely to go down the drain too. On balance, tuna seems like a relatively poor choice as a source of omega-3s - far inferior in this regard to a competing product, canned salmon.

Overall, salmon will turn out to be the best choice for most people. It is both readily available and reasonably economical. Although I disapprove of farmed fish because of bacterial and chemical contamination, these fish actually contain more fat than wild salmon - which is not surprising, considering that they are penned in with thousands of other fish for their entire lives, as I saw on a recent puffin-sighting boat trip along the eastern Canadian coast. Although I realize that salmon are natural jumpers, it was a bit disconcerting to see them frequently leaping high in the air, as if in a desperate attempt to escape their prison-like environment.

Farmed fish are also frequently fed antibiotics, food colorants and even genetically modified organisms (GMOs). Even if they are labeled organic they may still be unhealthful. However, farmed fish is often the only fatty fish that is available fresh in smaller markets.

I've always assumed that the health benefits of bluefish and mackerel were about equal, and was therefore surprised to find that mackerel actually contains more than three times as much beneficial fat as bluefish. I live on the Atlantic coast where, theoretically, fatty fish is abundant. However, these plentiful dark-meat fish are disdained as a source of human food and my neighbors usually consider them only to be good for chum or bait for the economically more valuable lobsters. It is dismaying that during the summer months one can see large schools of young mackerel (each one of which would make a fine meal) roiling the waters in the harbor while in the market one can only get farmed salmon or other fish that is trucked in from far away, such as tilapia from Mexico or even Chile.

TO BE CONCLUDED, WITH REFERENCES, NEXT WEEK

IN THE MAILBAG

We received a considerable amount of mail following our announcement last week that the newsletter was henceforth going to take a strongly prevention-oriented approach. The overwhelming tone of the incoming mail was positive. For example:

"As a dietitian I am thrilled that with the new Wellbeing newsletter, you will be changing your focus to prevention. I firmly believe that educating the public about prevention is the key to decreasing the burden of cancer and other "lifestyle diseases" on our healthcare system. Please keep up your good work."

But apparently not everyone was pleased. This reader was decidedly unhappy about the new focus:

"If you are going to a prevention emphasis what about those of us with cancer? Seems to me you have given up. Easier to talk prevention than investigate cure?"

Dr. Moss responds:

I would like to reassure this reader, and any other readers who have similar fears, that I am not abandoning the search for more effective cancer treatments. I continue to research and write about such treatments in my Moss Reports, my Current Topic monographs, and through magazine and journal articles, public and professional speeches, and media interviews. Occasionally, I will comment on treatment issues in Wellbeing, as well.

I also continue to speak to cancer patients nearly every day as part of my individualized phone consultation service. I try to help people dealing with cancer navigate the complexities of current therapy, and thus must continually monitor new and emerging treatment possibilities.

But judging from many requests over the years, there is a strong interest in newsletter articles focused on both primary and secondary prevention. In the US, cancer is now slated to afflict one in two men and one in three women. How can we reduce our risk of developing the myriad forms of this disease? That is the question I shall try to answer, on a week-by-week basis, in Wellbeing. I can't see how anyone can argue with the importance of this focus, while we continue to investigate treatment-related ideas in other, more appropriate venues than an online newsletter intended for mass consumption.

Since many of our readers are presently dealing with cancer, Wellbeing will not only talk about primary prevention strategies, but also about useful adjunctive treatments, ways in which cancer patients can support themselves systemically through cancer treatment, ways to speed recovery, new research on ways to prevent cancer recurrence, etc. I strongly believe that one should not view a cancer diagnosis as the end of the road. There is a great deal that patients can do to ameliorate their condition, to help themselves through treatment and to increase the odds against recurrence.

I remain a passionate advocate for cancer patients and their families, and am well aware of the hard road that they travel. The new Wellbeing newsletter is an expression of my continued and renewed commitment to the cause of mastering and overcoming cancer, both through innovative treatments and through the various methods of risk reduction that are constantly being revealed by innovative scientists.

--Ralph W. Moss, Ph.D.

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IMPORTANT DISCLAIMER

The news and other items in this newsletter are intended for informational purposes only. Nothing in this newsletter is intended to be a substitute for professional medical advice.