Cereals and a high fiber diet can officially help prevent and beat bowel cancer, according to new research.
It is well known that eating plenty of roughage through foods like pulses, veg and fruit reduce your risk of the disease.
Now scientists have discovered fiber boosts survival rates of those already diagnosed – even if their diet was poor before.
Compared to people with a low fiber intake, each additional five grams of roughage in the diet was linked with a 22 percent lower risk of being diagnosed with and dying from bowel cancer.
And among those already diagnosed, each additional five grams of fiber added to the diet brought an 18 percent fall in the likelihood of dying from the illness.
But not all types of roughage had the same life-saving effects: cereal fiber lowered patients’ the disease killing them but vegetable and fruit fiber made little to no difference.
The risk of colon cancer falls 33% for every 5g of whole grain cereal fiber eaten every day (stock photo)
‘Eating more fiber after colorectal cancer diagnosis is associated with a lower risk of dying from colorectal cancer,’ said senior study author Dr Andrew Chan from Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital in Boston.
‘This seems to be independent of the amount of fiber eaten before diagnosis.’
Colon cancer, also known as bowel or colorectal cancer, is one of the most common forms of cancer in men and women, causing 50,000 deaths in the US and 15,900 in the UK every year.
Patients with an advanced form of the disease have a five-year-survival of only 11 percent.
Key findings
Dr Chan and colleagues examined data on 1,575 adults diagnosed with colon cancer.
Half of the study sample were followed for at least eight years, during which they provided detailed accounts of their diet and its fiber content.
In that period 773 patients died, including 174 who died of colon and rectal tumors.
Compared to the lowest fiber intakes in the study, each additional five grams of fiber intake saw a 14 percent lower mortality from all causes of death, researchers report in the journal JAMA Oncology.
The type of fiber mattered, however.
‘It appears that cereal fiber and foods high in whole grains seem to be associated with the lowest risk of dying from colorectal cancer,’ Dr Chan said.
Each additional 5 grams a day of cereal fiber was linked to 33 percent lower odds of death from colorectal cancer and 22 percent lower odds of mortality from all causes, the study found.
Vegetable fiber wasn’t linked to a meaningful reduction in deaths from colon cancer, but each extra 5 grams a day was associated with 17 percent lower chances of death from all causes.
Fruit fiber, meanwhile, didn’t appear to lower death from cancer or other causes.
Other lifestyle factors
A high fiber diet won’t protect you from cancer altogether, Dr Samantha Hendren, a researcher at the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, who was not involved in the study, told Reuters.
Though it is possible that fiber may have beneficial effects on metabolism that may protect against cancer, your lifestyle is a bigger influence, she said.
‘The most important risk factors for colorectal cancer are family history, a personal history of polyps or cancer, diseases such as ulcerative colitis and not getting screened.
‘Not smoking, being normal weight and taking aspirin are all associated with lower colorectal cancer risk.’