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Keto can help prevent cancer: A new study on how keto helps you
24.09.2023 20:50
Updated: 13.05.2024 21:23
Dietitians believe that a keto diet, which is high in fat and low in carbs, can help people lose weight and may even fight certain cancers.
However, there's a problem: research shows that this diet might unintentionally harm cancer patients.
Let's find out more about this controversial situation and the study.
Keto and cancer studies
In studies with mice that had pancreatic and colorectal cancer, the keto diet made a serious condition called cachexia worse.
Cachexia is a disease that causes loss of appetite, extreme weight loss, tiredness, and weakens the immune system.
It's a severe problem with no good treatment and leads to about 2 million deaths each year.
Researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory found a way to reduce the harm caused by the keto diet in mice with cancer.
They combined the diet with common drugs called corticosteroids, and this prevented cachexia.
The tumors in these mice got smaller, and they lived longer.
Normally, when healthy mice go on a keto diet, they lose weight at first but then adapt, and their weight stabilizes.
However, mice with cancer can't adapt because they can't produce enough of a hormone called corticosterone, which helps control the effects of the keto diet.
It might be dangerous as well
The keto diet helps kill cancer cells by creating toxic byproducts, but this also triggers cachexia.
By giving the mice corticosteroids, the researchers were able to shrink the tumors without causing cachexia.
Why it might be useful
The researchers are part of a global effort to tackle cancer cachexia, and they are working to figure out the best timing and dosage for corticosteroids to make cancer treatments with the keto diet more effective and safer for patients.
They hope to slow down cancer growth and improve cancer treatments in the future.
