Newly diagnosed cancer patients should be told to diet and exercise, amid mounting evidence that shedding the pounds is the best way to fight the disease, global experts have advised.
A daily brisk walk of just 25 minutes was found to almost halve mortality among breast cancer sufferers, while a waistline larger than 35 inches increased death rates by one third.
Results from a slew of trials showed “powerful” and “groundbreaking” evidence of the benefits of a slim waistline, with weightloss and exercise helping even those with advanced cancer.
Even those who took little exercise before diagnosis saw major benefits, experts told the world’s largest cancer conference, in Chicago.
"This is absolutely ground-breaking. These were women with late stage ovarian cancer. They were able to exercise and willing to and having very favourable results."
Melissa Irwin
Health watchdogs the National Institute for Health and Care Excellence last night said they would consider the evidence, which could result in fresh advice to millions of Britons, with two in three adults overweight or obese.
Experts said losing 5 per cent of body weight – which could mean as little as ten pounds – could lead to a 20 per cent increase in breast cancer survival.
Leading oncologists said a cancer diagnosis offered a “window of opportunity” to convince patients to make lifestyle changes which could prolong their lives.
They said those receiving a diagnosis should be warned to lose weight and take more exercise, even if such conversations were “sensitive”.
One expert at the American Society of Clinical Oncology’s annual conference, launching the first trial into high intensity exercise for prostate cancer patients, said the NHS should prescribe personal trainers for those diagnosed with cancer.
Obesity is linked to more than 10 types of the disease, including breast, bowel and ovarian cancer.
But until now, much of the emphasis has been on preventing weight gain to reduce the chances of developing the disease, rather than raising the issue in patients with cancer.
Prof Melinda Irwin, Associate Director of Cancer Prevention for Yale Cancer Center, said diagnosis was a time for patients to make lifestyle changes.
She said: “After treatment, weight loss is the most powerful thing you can do. It’s the next best pill to treatment and it’s free and has no side effects.”
Prof Irwin said doctors needed to be “sensitive” in raising the issue with newly diagnosed patients, but should not duck the issue.
“Every woman diagnosed with breast cancer should be being counselled about weight loss and weight management, and about the role of exercise,” she said.
“Diagnosis offers a window of opportunity, and diet and exercise can have a profound and powerful effect.”
Yale research led by Dr Irwin tracking almost 5,000 breast cancer sufferers found that three hours brisk walking a week was linked to a 46 per cent fall in mortality. Even when women took up such regimes after decades of sedentary living, death rates fell by as much as 33 per cent.
The observational study could not prove that the exercise caused the gains.
But a raft of studies by Yale released in Chicago this week will reveal direct evidence about the mechanisms activated via weight loss and exercise.
Dr Irwin said she was particularly excited about results from the first ever randomised controlled trial looking at the impact of exercise on ovarian cancer.
More than half the women in the six month trial had advanced disease.
But those enrolled in a walking programme, doing at least 20 minutes a day of exercise saw “profound changes” in key biomarkers which reflect cancer progression.
“This is absolutely ground-breaking. These were women with late stage ovarian cancer. They were able to exercise and willing to and having very favourable results,” she said. The study of 144 women, found the half who were prescribed exercise saw a 27 per cent drop in levels of leptin, a hormone associated with cancer, and a 15 per cent decrease in IGF-1, a natural human growth hormone which fuels cancer spread.
Article in the Telegraph dated 6/6/16
A brisk walk may be just as good as a run for keeping the the heart healthy.
That’s encouraging, considering less than half of Americans meet the government’s recommendation of
at least 2.5 hours of moderate to intense aerobic exercise a week. A
new study published in the American Heart Association (AHA) journal Arteriosclerosis, Thrombosis and Vascular Biology found that walkers lowered their risk of high blood pressure, high cholesterol and diabetes as much as runners.
Researchers studied 33,060 runners who were participating in the
National Runners’ Health Study and 15,045 walkers enrolled in the
National Walkers’ Health Study over six years. All the participants were
between the ages of 18 to 80, with most in their 40s and 50s. The
exercises answered questionnaires about their physical activity, and the
researchers calculated how much energy they expended based on the
distance the volunteers reported walking or running. They also recorded
any doctor-diagnosed heart conditions.
MORE: A Daily Walk Can Reduce the Power of Weight-Gaining Genes
The scientists found that while vigorous running required slightly
higher levels of energy than moderate intensity walking, both translated
into a parallel drop in incidence of high blood pressure, high
cholesterol, diabetes, or heart disease over the study period. And the
more the participants walked or ran, the greater the benefit in lowering
their heart disease risk.
Although walking isn’t as intense as running, the study authors say
both target the same muscle groups, which could explain why
their results in improving heart health are so similar. The results
suggest that the type of exercise may not be as important as how much
people walk or run.
Here’s what the researchers found:
- Running significantly reduced the risk for being diagnosed with hypertension by 4.2% while walking reduced the risk by 7.2%
- Running reduced the chances of having high cholesterol by 4.3% and walking by 7%
- Running lowered risk of diabetes by 12.1% while walking dropped the risk by 12.3%
- Running reduced coronary heart disease risk by 4.5% compared to 9.3% for walking.
The results are encouraging since walking may be a more appealing and
sustainable for more people than running. Because running is a more
intense form of physical activity, runners are able to burn more
calories and exercise the heart to higher levels within a shorter period
of time, but the results support the idea that any physical activity,
as long as it’s consistent, can have lasting benefits. Last summer, the
Centers for Disease Control released a report
showing that more Americans are walking for exercise, and that those
who walk are three times more likely to meet the recommended level of
physical activity.
The TIME story on the report detailed the benefits:
What’s more, people who walk are significantly more
likely — three times more likely on average, in fact — to meet the
government’s physical activity recommendations. Overall, the survey data
showed, more Americans were meeting that goal in 2010 (48%) than in
2005 (41%), and more walkers (60%) than non-walkers (30%) met the
guideline. The more people walked, the more likely they were to meet the
exercise requirement: compared with non-walkers, those who walked 10-19
minutes a week were 34% more likely to meet the standard; those walking
20-29 minutes a week were 52% more likely; people who walked 30-59
minutes a week were 80% more likely; and those walking more than hour a
week were nearly four times more likely to get the minimum amount of
recommended exercise.
MORE: An Easy Way to Get Enough Exercise: Take a Walk
More data will likely continue to compare intense activity such as
running with more moderate exercise like walking for everything from weight loss to longevity,
but more studies show that for many, particularly those who are
relatively sedentary, walking may be a healthy and effective way to
start increasing physical activity. And research also supports the idea
that for the heart, it’s not the quantity so much as the consistency of
exercise that may keep atherosclerosis and high blood pressure at bay.
Thirteen Health Benefits of Walking
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