Welcome to Dr. Kim's Blog!

Beef....what's NOT in it!

2011-01-26T06:51:00.000-08:00

Taco Bell President Greg Creed said Tuesday in a statement that Taco Bell plans to take legal action against people making the allegations that the Taco Bell meat mixture contains binders and fillers. The lawsuit claims Taco Bell falls short of the USDA’s requirement that its filling be at least 40 percent fresh meat.

Creed said that Taco Bell buys the same brands of beef sold in supermarkets. He said the beef is simmered in a blend of seasonings.

What are the implications to cancer here? If the majority of fast food restaurants follow suit with Taco Bell, the amount of soy isoflavones in our food supply would be dramatically higher than we think. Soy isoflavones are contraindicated for women with a history of breast, uterine, ovarian and other estrogen-receptor positive cancers because the concentrated isoflavones may spur on the growth of these kinds of cancer cells.

What do to now? Limit your consumption of beef products....at even the "allowed" 40% beef in beef, you have to ask, "what makes up the other 60% of what I am eating?"

Plant based antioxidants causing cancer?

2010-10-27T13:10:00.000-07:00

New research findings published in the Journal of Agricultural and Food Chemistry point to dangerous peril for cancer patients taking plant based antioxidants. Researcher Chen, et al, found that when severely diabetic rats were fed quercetin and ferulic acid (two antioxidants found in apples, onions and other produce) appeared to have aggravated kidney cancer.

This is what the press is reporting....but here's the important facts:

* One of the side effects to poorly controlled diabetes is kidney damage
* Quercetin and ferulic acid were isolated and concentrated - any time you pull out one major ingredient in a food, it creates an inbalance in the body
* Whole foods have been proved to be effective in the fight against cancer, so I would encourage EATING whole food products and avoiding dietary supplements containing isolated

If you can't get enough fruits and veggies (9-13 servings a day) consider a whole food based concentrate. I recommend and use Juice Plus+

Kim Dalzell, PhD, RD
www.naturesanswertocancer.com

Counting Calories or Confusion?

2010-09-21T09:56:00.000-07:00

Did you realize that your perception about the “calorie” cost of a food could determine what you end up eating?
According to a new study in the Journal of Consumer Research, researchers found out that
the sequence in which items are considered often influences our evaluations of these items.
In one of Dr. Chernev's studies, he found that a group of participants' impressions of how many calories a cheeseburger had depended on whether they were first shown a salad or the cheeseburger. The people who saw the cheeseburger first thought it had 570 calories, whereas the participants who first estimated the calories of the salad thought the cheeseburger had 787 calories—a 38 percent difference.

"Simply switching the order in which our respondents evaluated the two meals resulted in significant changes in their perceived calorie content," Chernev writes. Reversing the order in which the respondents considered the items also increased the overall calorie estimation from 757 to 1,097 calories.

When the foods are quite dissimilar (a "virtuous" salad versus an "indulgent" slice of cheesecake), people get even more confused about calories. Even though participants knew a fruit salad had fewer calories than a piece of cheesecake, they perceived a salad/cheeseburger sequence to have more calories than a cheesecake/cheeseburger combo.

Here’s the bottom line: If you tend to overestimate the calorie content of healthy/indulgent sequences of items, you are also likely to make healthier food choices based on that perception.

To what kind of food are you comparing your lunch choice today?

By Kim Dalzell, PhD, RD

www.naturesanswertocancer.com

Muscle, not just Fat, Linked to Cancer

2010-08-27T13:30:00.000-07:00

To reduce risk of cancer recurrence, especially in hormone-dependent cancers, I have recommended that my patients maintain a regimen of regular aerobic exercise such as jogging or cycling. Now, I think I’m going to also discuss adding weight lifting and resistance training.
A new study, published in the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, suggests building up muscle strength has anti-cancer benefits.
A team of experts, led by scientists from Sweden's Karolinska Institute, tracked the lifestyles of 8,677 men aged between 20 and 82 for more than two decades and researchers monitored how many developed cancer and subsequently died from it.
The results showed men who regularly worked out with weights and had the highest muscle strength were between 30 and 40 per cent less likely to lose their life to a deadly tumor. Even among volunteers who had excess tummy fat or a high body mass index, regular weight training seemed to have a protective effect.
This finding is pretty profound considering the fact that belly fat is metabolically active and correlated to hormone deposition.
So while there is no need to become Arnold Schwarzenegger, it is important to incorporate flexibility, strength training and aerobic movement into your daily routine.

www.naturesanswertocancer.com

Dental Disease Linked to Pancreatic Cancer

2010-08-27T13:19:00.000-07:00

August 24, 2010
A Prospective Study of Periodontal Disease and Pancreatic Cancer

Can diseased gums increase the risk of pancreatic cancer?

Epidemiologists at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston think it could, at least according to the findings of a study analyzing 16 years of health data on more than 52,000 men.
Dominique Michaud, Sc.D., assistant professor of epidemiology in the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston, and colleagues at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the University of Puerto Rico wanted to know if inflammation, and specifically, systemic inflammation from periodontal disease, might be related to pancreatic cancer.
According to Michaud, several studies have linked inflammation and cancer, and researchers have found a high risk of developing pancreatic cancer among individuals with pancreatitis, or inflammation of the pancreas. But the ties between periodontal disease and cancer have been more tenuous.
Previous studies have shown associations between tooth loss and cancer, and pancreatic cancer as well. But the validity of such studies was questionable because of confounding factors, including smoking, which contributes to both periodontal disease and cancer. An association with periodontal disease and heart disease has also been examined, with systemic inflammation being a potential mechanism behind the connection. Periodontal disease results in chronic inflammation over many years, both in the mouth and potentially, systemically, as well.
The researchers analyzed the health records of a fairly homogenous group of about 52,000 highly educated, male health professionals between ages 40 and 75 who participated in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study, which was created in 1986 to look at lifestyle factors related to cancer and other chronic diseases. They continue to be followed at present through mailed questionnaires, with a greater than 95 percent follow-up rate, Michaud said.
The researchers recorded 216 cases of pancreatic cancer in the 16 years of follow-up between 1986 and 2002. Men who reported having periodontal disease had a 63 percent higher risk of developing pancreatic cancer compared to those who did not report periodontal disease, after the team adjusted for smoking, diabetes, age, physical activity and diet. Those men who never smoked fared even worse, with a two-fold increase in risk. Men who reported a history of periodontal disease and tooth loss in the last four years showed a more than a 2.5-fold increase in the risk of developing pancreatic cancer compared to those without periodontal disease and recent tooth loss.
In a secondary analysis, the team looked at tooth loss at both the beginning of the study (baseline) and during the follow-up period. While tooth loss at baseline was not associated with a risk of pancreatic cancer, those who lost teeth during follow up showed an increased, albeit lesser, risk for pancreatic cancer. Tooth loss among older individuals is likely due to periodontal disease, Michaud explained, whereas tooth loss at enrollment in the study is more likely to reflect teeth that were lost or removed because of cavities.
"The results confirm our hypothesis that pancreatic cancer is related to periodontal disease, not merely tooth loss," Michaud said.
Other potential mechanisms, she said, include the fact that those with periodontal disease have high amounts of bacteria in the mouth and in the gut, and also tend to have higher amounts of nitrosamines, which have been proposed to increase pancreatic cancer risk.
"The work might provide new insights in understanding the role of systemic inflammation on initiation or promotion of pancreatic cancer," she said. Smoking, she noted, is a risk factor that could be acting as a promoter by causing inflammation.
"Establishing whether periodontal disease increases the risk and understanding the mechanisms behind these associations are important because we know so little about pancreatic cancer."
Pancreatic cancer, the fourth-leading cause of cancer death in this country, takes some 30,000 lives a year.

For more information about how nutritional status impacts cancer, please visit www.naturesanswertocancer.com