Madam Lichtenstein's Cosmic World

Antioxidant Supplements - Do They Help Cancer Cells?

My friend Arthur sends me many emails on health related subjects. This latest one is really an eye opener. I can't say for sure that this research is definitive but the concept behind it is compelling to me.

Derek Lowe in his blog writes that certain tests show that taking anti-oxidant supplements and vitamins containing antioxidents may help cancer cells grow and travel through the body. This is because antioxidants help feed cells rather than starve cells - feed all cells including cancerous ones. The blog post is full of medical language but the upshot is that cells eventually die off which is what we especially want in cancer cells. However antioxidants kept this from happening:

"The normal process is for the central cells in such growths to eventually die off (luminal clearance), but antioxidant treatment kept this from happening. Even more alarmingly, they showed that tumor cells expressing various oncogenes colonized an in vitro cell growth matrix much more effectively in the presence of antioxidants as well."

The article concludes: "The biggest questions, though, are the most immediate: first, does it make any sense at all to give antioxidants to cancer patients? Right now, I'd very much have to wonder. And second, could taking antioxidants actually have a long-term cancer-promoting effect under normal conditions? I'd very much like to know that one, and so would a lot of other people."

What is someone to do here? Do we stop taking certain vitamins? Do we avoid antioxidants? Anyone have an opinion on this? The comments to Derek's post are also interesting - here are a few:

Antioxidants will act to suppress cancer before it occurs. After cancer develops these studies suggest that antioxidants may enhance cancers ability to survive, proliferate and metastasize.

A couple of lung cancer prevention trials have shown elevated cancer rates in groups taking vitamin E supplements IIRC

This was very technical research, aimed at finding the WHY behind what observational studies of cancer patients have been telling them for years. The thing to keep in mind for practical purposes is that there is a huge different between antioxidant supplementation, and the antioxidants you get from food. They've known for ages, and recent research confirms, that eating antioxidant rich foods helps immune function and very slightly reduces cancer risk. Antioxidant supplements, on the other hand, have been shown in scads of studies to produce variable and often contradictory effects. This study doesn't change anything, it just sheds a little more light, at the biochemical level, on why this is so.

 

Prevent Swine Flu ... One Drink At A Time

I have stumbled on a site that, as a public service, I am willing to forward on. It is list of mixed alcoholic drinks that might just ward off the swine flu.... or maybe not but who knows until you tried it.

 

With such compelling beverages as the Cold-Eeze and Brandy which has Active ingredients: Cold-Eeze lozenges, honey and Inactive ingredients: honey-pepper vodka, Benedictine and brandy. The site advises that there are Clinical trials: A reserve of honey for throat ailments, and a pepper bite to make you forget you're swilling Cold-Eeze. This is the medicine and the spoonful-of-sugar in one glass.

 

The Chicken Soup Cocktail

Active ingredients: organic chicken broth, ramen noodles
Inactive ingredients: jalapeño-infused tequila, cilantro, garlic cloves
Clinical trials: We wouldn't normally recommend combining our soup and spirits, but these trying times call for critical advances in the cocktail sciences. And if those advances involve ramen and chicken broth, so be it.

Read more: http://www.urbandaddy.com/nyc/nightlife/roundup/7876/The_Flu_Menu_at_Drop_Off_Service_Prevent_Swine_Flu_One_Drink_at_a_Time_New_York_City_NYC_Event#ixzz0VpjrXZPV

Interested? Get started on your Cold Eeze cocktail now. I don't know if these alcoholic type cocktail drinks really do prevent swine flu but I am willing to try them! Maybe I'll start with the Chicken Soup Cocktail....

 

Frankincense "Can Ease Arthritis"

I am a big fan of aromatherapy so when I discovered this BBC news article about the added benefits of Frankincense, I was thrilled. Frankincense is one of three essential aromatherapy fragrances associated with religion. Of course we know that frankincense was one of the three gifts that the Magi brought to Mary, Joseph and the newborn Jesus.

 

Frankincense represents Christianity. It is used as an analgestic, it reduces pain and it is antiseptic. It also has a long lasting scent. It is often used in prayers and rituals. Some believe that frankinsence heals wounds in the heart. But few of us realized that it can be scientifically proven that frankincense helps ease arthritis.  

 Here is the excerpted article: 

A herb known as "Indian Frankincense" can reduce the symptoms of arthritis, US researchers have suggested.

Extracts from Boswellia serrata, a similar species to the variety famous for its role in the Christian nativity, were tested on dozens of patients. Those who received it reported better movement and less pain and stiffness. The herb has been used for thousands of years in Indian Ayurvedic medicine, reports the journal Arthritis Research and Therapy.

Osteoarthritis is the most common form of the condition, and normally affects the weight bearing joints such as hands, wrists, feet and spine. Current treatments carry a great many adverse effects, and scientists have been hunting for an alternative. Some of the 70 patients with severe arthritis in their knees recruited into the trial were given a low-dose capsule, some a higher dose capsule, and the remainder were given a dummy pill with no active ingredients.

In as little as seven days, patients taking the frankincense drug reported improvements in their pain and stiffness levels compared with the placebo group, and these continued until the 90-day mark, when the study ended.

But note - "This report on treating knee pain with a chemical derivative of B. serrata is interesting but the patient numbers are small, there were some problems with the reported trial design and we need more information on its medium to long-term safety."

Treadmill vs Weights - Which Makes You Smarter?

 

The New York Times just reported a new study that says that running hard on a treadmill can make you smarter but lifting weights probably won't.

Well, at least it is so in mice. Recent research from a university study in China saw that those mice who were forced to run hard in their cage's treadmill were able to perform higher level tasks than those who merely jogged along at a low speed. The two groups were tested for "learning skills and memory." In one test, the mice had to swim through a water maze and in the other they had to "endure an unpleasant stimulus to see how quickly they would learn to move away from it." This went on for four weeks and both groups did well on the water maze, which was the easier test. But only the huffing and puffing treadmill runners did better with "the avoidance task, a skill that, according to brain scientists , demands a more complicated cognitive response."

Does this mean that those of us who lie around and don't exert themselves have a higher tolerancy for torture? Just thinking.......

Another study, this one with humans, had a similar result. This study involved "21 students at the University of Illinois." The students were required to memorize a string of letters, and then tested on it after either sitting quietly, running on a treadmill or lifting weights for 30 minutes. Each group was tested a second time after a 30 minute cooldown, and the treadmill runners did best. The thought here is that a fairly dramatic change in blood flow can stimulate the brain. Weight lifting doesn't flow blood to the brain.

In case you decide to start running, try this book - Runner's World Complete Book of Women's Running: The Best Advice to Get Started, Stay Motivated, Lose Weight, Run Injury-Free, Be Safe, and Train for Any Distance (Runner's World Complete Books)

Broccoli

We can never be reminded enough of the healthful attributes of leafy green vegetables like broccoli. Old news for some of us but maybe it will spur others to try it occasionally -

Researchers at Imperial College London have found evidence a chemical in broccoli and other green leafy vegetables could boost a natural defense mechanism that protects arteries from the clogging that can cause heart attacks.

In a study funded by the British Heart Foundation charity and conducted on mice, the researchers found that sulforaphane -- a compound occurring naturally in broccoli and other brassicas -- could "switch on" a protective protein which is inactive in parts of the arteries vulnerable to clogging.

"We know that vegetables are clearly good for you, but surprisingly the molecular mechanisms of why they are good for you have remained unknown for many years," said Paul Evans of the National Heart and Lung Institute at Imperial College.

Feeling ambitious? Why not try growing your own? Try these Organic Broccoli Sprouting Seeds - 16 Oz (1 Lbs)- Organic- Edible Seed, Gardening, Hydroponics, Growing Salad Sprout & Food Storage- Brocolli Sprouts Contain Sulforaphane