The typical Western diet may be more than just hazardous to the health of patients treated for colon cancer. New research suggests it may be deadly. Former patients in the study who ate the most red and processed meats, refined grains, fats, and sugars were about three times as likely to die or have their cancers recur as patients who ate these foods the least.
While there is no shortage of evidence linking the so-called Western diet to an increased risk for developing colon cancer, the study is among the first to examine the impact of such a diet on survival among patients treated for the disease.
The findings must be confirmed, but Dana-Farber Cancer Center oncologist Jeffrey Meyerhardt, MD, a researcher on the team, says they cannot be ignored by colon cancer patients or their physicians. The study appears in the Aug. 15 issue of the Journal of the American Medical Association.