Photo (c) Tanja Ivanova – Getty ImagesMany consumers adopt a keto diet in an effort to burn more fat and help them lose weight. However, researchers from Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory found that this low-carb-centered diet may also be effective at slowing the progression of cancer.
On the keto diet, you not only cut out carbohydrates but increase fat consumption to help your body produce more energy.
Though early trials have found that keto diets are likely to be associated with cachexia, a disease common in cancer patients that gradually breaks down all of the body’s processes, more recent research has found a way around this deadly side effect.
In a trial conducted on mice, experts found that a keto diet coupled with a corticosteroid had two-fold benefits: it prevented cachexia and it slowed the progression of the mice’s cancer and ultimately helped them live longer.
“Cancer is a whole-body disease,” said researcher Miriam Ferrer. “It reprograms normal biological processes to help it grow. Because of this reprogramming, mice can’t use the nutrients from a keto diet, and waste away. But with the steroid, they did much better. They lived longer than with any other treatment we tried.”
Slowing tumor growth
Earlier research has found that following a keto diet can be beneficial for cancer, as the high-fat and low-carb-centric meals ultimately deprive cancer cells of the compounds they need to survive and multiply. However, with this trial, and moving forward, the researchers’ primary goal was figuring out how to prevent the onset of cachexia and also slow the progression of cancer, while also maintaining a keto diet.
They explained that the hormone corticosterone is what allows the body to process the benefits of a keto diet; however, for those with cancer, it’s difficult for the body to naturally produce corticosterone.
This led to their latest treatment trial: the keto diet and a corticosteroid. The combination did exactly what the researchers hoped – it boosted the mice’s corticosterone levels, slowed the cancer progression, and prevented cachexia.
The plan now for the researchers is to further finetune this approach to have even…