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Can A Cabbage A Day Keep Cancer Away?
If you are a woman, you should be concerned
about breast cancer. If you are a man, you
should be concerned about prostate cancer. And
if you are concerned about either breast cancer
or prostate cancer, you should know that eating
cruciferous vegetables, such as broccoli and
cabbage, is really good for you. Eating half of
a head of cabbage each day or extremely large
amounts of other cruciferous vegetables is what
it would take to get the kind of health risk
reduction you're looking for-and that is neither
practical nor palatable. But, if science could
separate the cancer fighting substance in the
vegetables and pack them into a pill or capsule,
it might actually help save your life. That is
precisely what has happened.
What is indole-3-- carbinol (I3C)?
The indole group of sulfur compounds binds
to chemical carcinogens and activates enzymes
that in turn detoxify those chemical
carcinogens. Indole-3carbinol (130 is a
phytonutrient that occurs naturally in certain
cruciferous vegetables, appearing to affect
estrogen metabolism in ways that might help
prevent breast cancer,1 and indole-3-carbinol
may also be critical in preventing or retarding
prostate cancer.2 I3C is the specific
phytonutrient that has been shown to act as a
catalyst to pull estradiol down a benign pathway
to 2-hydroxyestrone. After isolating I3C,
scientists have been able to prepare
nutraceuticals of I3C at the proper physiologic
dose to help prevent both breast cancer in women
and prostate cancer in men. Every non-pregnant
woman3 and every man should consider taking
pharmacy grade I3C as part of his or her daily
nutraceutical regimen for disease prevention.
What does indole-3-carbinol do?
In 1991 researchers at the Institute for
Hormone Research in New York City proved that
I3C significantly reduced the incidence and, in
fact, the number of tumors in female mice prone
to developing breast cancer. In human studies,
levels of "strong" estrogen declined and levels
of "weak" estrogen increased and most important,
there was a marked decrease in the level of the
estrogen metabolite associated with breast and
endometrial cancer (16-- alpha-hydroxyestrone).
Furthermore, I3C fits into the aryl hydrocarbon
(Ah) receptor but according to researchers at
Texas A&M, unlike the toxic chemical dioxin,
that also activates the Ah receptor, I3C not
only positively affects estrogen metabolism but
I3C also can keep dioxin out of the cells.
But if I3C alters estrogen metabolism, how can
it be effective in preventing or even retarding
prostate cancer? When the cancer cell is stopped
at the checkpoint, the body has more of a chance
to destroy it before it can grow. Furthermore,
because it is the balance of hormone cells in
prostate cancer that is important, rather than
the level of any particular hormone, how is it
possible for I3C to be effective against
prostate cancer? The answer is that its
effectiveness against prostate cancer comes from
the other anticancer properties that I3C
contains. Indole-3-carbinol has been shown to
force cancer cells to stop at "checkpoints,"
like a normal, healthy cell does before
replicating. It also has the potential to help
restore communication to the sex hormones
through the Ah receptor discussed above. In
prostate cancer, sex hormone cells cannot
communicate normally, telling other cells to do
things like grow. It appears that I3C is one of
a few substances4 that have the ability to
restore communications.
Will indole-3-carbinol absolutely prevent
breast cancer or stop or retard prostate cancer?
No one knows for sure, but current
government studies are very promising. The
problem seems to be that these studies are too
limited in scope (less than 250 women) and
lacking the hundreds of millions of dollars that
have gone into the research and development of
synthetic chemicals like tamoxifen. Can it be
that the money for research and development is
more likely to go to drugs on which companies
can claim patents rather than on such natural
substances as those found in a head of cabbage?
Meanwhile, even the American Cancer Society has
advised men to reduce their risk of prostate
cancer by increasing their intake of cruciferous
vegetables. Studies, such as in 1998 from the
University of California at Berkeley,5 have
shown that indole-3-carbinol was 30 percent more
effective than tamoxifen in inhibiting the
growth of estrogen receptor-- positive breast
cancer cells. Thus it would be wise to take heed
of what your grandmother used to tell you: "Eat
your vegetables. They're good for you."
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