Study: Vitamins Linked to Prostate Cancer

Study: Vitamins Linked to Prostate Cancer

Wednesday, May 16, 2007

There’s more worrisome news about vitamins: Taking too many may increase men’s risk of dying from prostate cancer.

The study, being published Wednesday, doesn’t settle the issue. But it is the biggest yet to suggest high-dose multivitamins may harm the prostate, and the latest chapter in the confusing quest to tell whether taking various vitamins really helps a variety of conditions — or is a waste of money, or worse.

Government scientists turned to a study tracking the diet and health of almost 300,000 men. About a third reported taking a daily multivitamin, and 5 percent were heavy users, swallowing the pills more than seven times a week.

Within five years of the study’s start, 10,241 men had been diagnosed with prostate cancer. Some 1,476 had advanced cancer; 179 died.

Heavy multivitamin users were almost twice as likely to get fatal prostate cancer as men who never took the pills, concludes the study in Wednesday’s Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

Here’s the twist: Overall, the researchers found no link between multivitamin use and early-stage prostate cancer.

The researchers speculate that perhaps high-dose vitamins had little effect until a tumor appeared, and then could spur its growth.

While similar but smaller studies have suggested a link, too, more rigorous research is needed, caution the National Cancer Institute scientists. This newest study involves men who voluntarily took vitamins, and those most at risk — perhaps because they had a family history of the disease — may have been more likely to take the pills in hopes of avoiding their fate.

Still, "the findings lend further credence to the possibility of harm associated with increased use of supplements," Dr. Christian Gluud of Copenhagen University Hospital and Dr. Goran Bjelakovic of Serbia’s University of Nis wrote in an accompanying editorial.

Interesting. Although there is no mention of dosages used, unfortunately.

I wish they would define what high dosage is. My guess would be a regular multivitamin like One-A-Day Mens Formula, is not high dose and as long as you just take one a day, you are OK.

“While similar but smaller studies have suggested a link, too, more rigorous research is needed, caution the National Cancer Institute scientists. This newest study involves men who voluntarily took vitamins, and those most at risk — perhaps because they had a family history of the disease — may have been more likely to take the pills in hopes of avoiding their fate.”

Here’s a link to the published study:

http://jnci.oxf ordjournals.org … /full/99/10/754

I’m really surprised that no one has posted the oral sex / throat cancer study yet.

Oral sex cures/prevents throat cancer? But only if she swallows? I’ll volunteer for that study.

Figures, I just go back on the vitamins and Ike posts this. :noreally:

Oral sex can cause throat cancer

22:00 09 May 2007
NewScientist.com news service
Roxanne Khamsi

People who have had more than five oral-sex partners in their lifetime are 250% more likely to have throat cancer than those who do not have oral sex, a new study suggests.

The researchers believe this is because oral sex may transmit human papillomavirus (HPV), the virus implicated in the majority of cervical cancers.

The new findings should encourage people to consistently use condoms during oral sex as this could protect against HPV, the team says. Other experts say that the results provide more reason for men to receive the new HPV vaccine.

Maura Gillison at Johns Hopkins Bloomberg School of Public Health in Baltimore, Maryland, US, and colleagues collected blood and saliva samples from the throats of 100 patients diagnosed with cancers of the tonsils or back of the throat. The scientists also took samples from 200 healthy people for comparison.

By combining the blood and saliva samples with antibody molecules, Gillison’s team could tell whether a person had ever had an HPV infection.
Cancer traps

All of the study participants provided information about their sexual history, including the number of people with whom they had engaged in oral sex.

After controlling for other risk factors for throat cancer, such as drinking and smoking, the analysis revealed that people who had prior infection with HPV were 32 times as likely to have this cancer as those with no evidence of ever having the virus. And those who tested positive for a particularly aggressive strain of the virus, called HPV-16, were 58 times more likely to have throat cancer.

By comparison, either smoking or drinking increases the risk of such cancer by about threefold.

The throat cancers analysed in the new study mostly started in the “crypts” of the throat – the grooves at the base of the tonsils. This might be because the tonsil grooves trap infectious particles, suggests Mark Stoler of the University of Virginia in Charlottesville, US, who was not involved in the study.
High risk levels

The study also revealed a link between oral sex and throat cancer caused by HPV. People who had one to five oral-sex partners in their lifetime had approximately a doubled risk of throat cancer compared with those who never engaged in this activity - and those with more than five oral-sex partners had a 250% increased risk.

There was an even stronger link between oral sex and throat cancers clearly caused by HPV-16 (those tumours that tested positive for the strain). People with more than five oral sex partners had a 750% increased risk of these HPV-16-caused cancers.

“This study is important because it is putting all of the pieces together,” says Gillison. “We need to add oral HPV infection to the list of risks for oral cancer,” she adds.
Virus vaccine

A vaccine against several of the most aggressive strains of HPV linked to cervical cancer received approval from the US Food and Drug Administration in 2006. However the plan to vaccinate adolescent girls with this vaccine developed by Merck, called Gardasil, has received some criticism.

There have been no studies investigating whether the vaccine can also protect against throat cancer, but the new evidence linking HPV to throat cancer could lead to broader vaccination with Gardasil. “We will see a push for vaccination in men,” says Stoler, who has been involved in the development of the vaccine.

Tonsil and throat cancers affect about two in every 100,000 adults in the US. The new results could promote the development of spit tests for HPV infection to help identify people at high risk for these cancers, researchers say.

Journal reference: New England Journal of Medicine (vol 356, p 1944)

Link

Links to other oral sex / cancer studies on the website.

It’s possible that high doses of folic acid could fuel existing tumors. Folic acid derivatives are cofactors in nucleotide biosynthesis, and since cancerous cells multiply more rapidly than normal cells, they would benefit from (and seemingly require) higher levels of this vitamin. Methotrexate is a drug commonly used in the treatment of cancerous tumors because it inhibits folic acid metabolism, which affects cancer cells more than it affects normal cells.

This is just my speculation, and folic acid may have nothing to do with it, but everything I said above is correct.

They did not define how much is a mega dose.

Expired fat soluble vitamins are dangerous to take check your expiration dates.

I’m sure the study is propaganda to sell more drugs.

Well too much of any substance could be harmful.

For example L-tyrosine is great for depression but if you take it with MOA inhibitors you can have a stroke. Tyrosine will also encourage tumor growth.

An expired fat-soluble vitamin would simply be ineffective, not toxic, if taken in normal amounts.

Tyrosine is in every food with protein. So you’re saying everyone on an MAOI should have a stroke?

I don’t see how there is any propaganda….

What a load of bunkum