A new study has found that eating a Mediterranean diet, including more fruits and fish, while cutting down on soft drinks can lower the risk of bowel cancer.
Bowel cancer is one of the most common forms of cancer in the UK, with the majority of those impacted being over the age of 60.
For a while now, there have been links between the Mediterranean diet and a reduction in bowel cancer risk, but this new research seems to pin down the exact reasons for these links.
Naomi Fliss Isakov, from Tel-Aviv Medical Centre, in Tel Aviv, Israel said:”We found that each one of these three choices were associated with a little more than 30 per cent reduced odds of a person having an advanced, pre-cancerous colorectal lesion, compared to people who did not eat any of the Mediterranean diet components.
“Among people who made all three healthy choices the benefit was compounded to almost 86 per cent reduced odds.”
The research team used dietary questionnaires, taken from over 800 participants aged between 40 and 70, to analyse the links between certain foods and bowel cancer.
Researchers defined following the Mediterranean diet as eating a large amount of fruits, nuts and seed, whole grains, fish and poultry, while avoiding red meat, soft drinks and alcohol.
Colonoscopies were then compared with investigators finding that those with fewer polyps, which are considered to be a cause of bowel cancer, followed the Mediterranean diet more closely.
The researchers also found that any adherence to the Mediterranean diet impacted the development of polyps.
Following adjustments to account for other risk factors, the research team were able to find that high consumption of fish and fruit, when combined with avoiding soft drinks, was the best combination for lowering the risk of bowel cancer.
It is believed that the next stage of the investigation would be to discover whether high-risk groups were also affected by a Mediterranean diet.
Dirk Arnold, from the European Society for Medical Oncology, said: “This large population-based cohort-control study impressively confirms the hypothesis of an association of colorectal polyps with diets and other life-style factors.
“This stands in line with other very recent findings on nutritive effects, such as the potential protective effects of nut consumption and Vitamin D supplementation which have been shown earlier this year.
“However, it remains to be seen whether these results are associated with reduced mortality, and it is also unclear if, and when a dietary change would be beneficial.
“Despite this lack of information, it makes sense to consider this diet for other health-related reasons also.”
