The study shows that vegetarians develop several common and rare cancers less often

Last study in He examined the connections between different types of vegetarian diets and the risk of cancer in different places of the body.

Diet and cancer

A vegetarian diet is a diet pattern, which usually focuses on a higher consumption of vegetables, fruits, nuts and legumes when limiting or excluding meat. In contrast, the western diet is characterized by high intake of refined grains, processed food, red meat and sweet drinks.

High -fruit and vegetable consumption leads to increased exposure to phytoconstitents that have anti -cancer effects. In addition, the exclusion of meat consumption in a vegetarian diet reduces the risk of obesity, which is associated with many types of cancer. Although the relationship between vegetarian dietary habits and cancers remained controversial in various bodily places, several solid connections were established. For example, both processed and unprocessed red meat consumption has been associated with an increased risk of colorectal cancer.

Previous publications of the group behind this study indicated the protective connection between the vegetarian diet and common cancers, such as large intestine, breast and prostate. However, further research is needed to combine a vegetarian diet with less common types of cancer.

About the study

In the current study, the Adventist Health Study-2 (AHS-2) cohort was examined to examine the relationship between a vegetarian diet and less common cancer. This study focuses on the basis of knowledge about the benefits of vegetarian diet in a wider type of cancer types.

Kohort AHS-2 recruited participants from the United States and Canada in the years 2002–2007. Of the 95,863 saved participants, about 26,000 were black, which allowed scientists to focus on this minority group. Participants were studied based on the criteria for the eligibility and availability of full data relevant to this study.

All participants completed a comprehensive questionnaire regarding their diet patterns and were divided into various groups based on their answers. Participants were assigned to one of the following groups: vegans, lacto-ovo-vegetarians, pesco-vegetarians, half vegetarians or not vegetarians.

Participants who avoided all products of animal origin were included in the vegan group, while those who avoided all meat (meat or fish), but consumed eggs and dairy products, were assigned to the Lacto-Ovo-Vegetarian group. Similarly, pesco-vegetarians were defined as lacto-ovo-vegetarians, who also consumed fish at least once a month, while semi-vegetarians rarely ate fish dishes (at least once a month, but less than once a week).

The authors have adapted AHS-2 data to all registers of the state of the state of the United States, except for Maine and three Canadian province registers in order to identify new diagnoses of cancer. For every place for cancer, participants were stratified for age, sex, education and past and current cancer research habits.

Research results

In total, 79,468 participants met the eligibility criteria, covering 26% black and 65% of participants. The current study enabled an average of 7.9 years of observation for the participant. The marginal standardization method was used to compare vegetarians with non -vegetarian participants, after adapting age, sex and breed.

With the exception of the family history of breast cancer, significant differences in groups were observed. For example, a larger percentage of vegetarians was older, less often used contraceptives, it is less likely that the hormone replacement therapy after menopause was a little longer breastfed and were more educated.

The current study showed that the differences between vegetarians and non-vegetarians were almost zero or favored vegetarians for all types of cancer, except for myeloma. Compared to adventist non-vegetarians, all vegetarian diets were associated with a reduced risk of both (risk indicator [HR]: 0.88) and medium frequency cancers (HR: 0.82).

The authors have noticed that adaptation to the body mass index (BMI) slightly weakened these protective connections, which suggests that the lower body weight among vegetarians partly mediates in these benefits. It is worth noting that not even vegetarian Adventists in the study are a group of conscious health, consuming less meat and alcohol than a general population, which may mean that the protective effect of vegetarian diet can be even more pronounced compared to a typical Western diet.

Various vegetarian diets have been shown to independently affect specific types of cancer. For example, a vegan diet was associated with a lower frequency of breast and prostate cancer at a young age, although no prostate cancer was observed in older men. Pesco-vegetarians were exposed to lower risk of colorectal cancer (also significant discovery for all vegetarians, HR: 0.79) and older breast cancer.

A significantly lower risk of lymphoproliferative (covering lymphomas) tumors was observed in vegetarians (HR: 0.75), with lacto-ovo-vegetarians, and in some age groups vegans showing lower risk.

The risk of stomach cancer was much lower among all combined vegetarians (HR: 0.55), and the article noted that it was also observed at lacto-vegetable. Some of these arrangements specific to the place were based on relatively small numbers of cases and should be interpreted carefully. Further tests are necessary to determine whether a vegetarian diet affects the risk of pancreatic, lungs and ovarian cancers.

Conclusions

In the current study, it emphasized the benefits of a vegetarian diet in terms of lowering the risk of several cancers. No evidence has shown that a vegetarian diet pattern increases the risk of any cancer.

The authors indicated several restrictions on the current study. For example, a relatively small number of less common cancers can be associated with vegans and pesco-vegetarians. The authors also noticed that diet information was collected only at the beginning of the study, not during the observation. Future research must interpret the results of the current study, taking into account the special racial mix of the AHS-2 cohort.