We’re all familiar with the phrase, “you are what you eat.”

We’re encouraged to follow a balanced diet, but sometimes it’s a struggle to cut through the noise of diet culture and marketing tricks.

It’s often assumed that diet doesn’t affect the development of diseases. But processed foods and additives can make us more susceptible to diabetes and high cholesterol, leading to other severe diseases.

Recent scientific studies have confirmed that high blood glucose levels are directly associated with diseases such as cancer, Alzheimer’s, and cardiovascular diseases.

Most of the food marketed to us is extremely high in sugar – and even non-sweet foods like bread and pasta can bump up our blood sugar levels.

Glucose: a love/hate relationship

Our bodies need glucose to function, but we tend to over-consume it in our modern diets.

Large amounts of glucose in our diet can cause a variety of health troubles, including cancer.

Awareness of our glucose intake is essential because tumour cells use glucose to grow stronger and multiply. This was initially discovered in the 1920s by Otto Warburg, a German biochemist. Now known as the ‘Warburg effect’, this discovery has helped shape scientists’ research on the effects of diet and cancer.

Malignant tumour cells use a lactic acid-producing fermentation metabolism for energy production even in the presence of oxygen – and they can only use glucose to do this.

So, when glucose is available in the body, cancer cells use glucose to metastasise and spread.

Cancer cells can also use glucose to repair any damage to their DNA caused by chemo- or radiotherapy treatments. This makes the exhausting process of chemo- or radiotherapy treatments less effective.

So why aren’t doctors prescribing informative, easy-to-follow nutrition plans alongside modern medicine?

Some cancer hospitals have started incorporating nutrition and diet into their treatment plans, but it has yet to become a regular part of clinical practice.

This is why, at RMDM, we strive to provide a complete package of solutions across the full range of diagnostics, pharma, and nutrition. We steadfastly believe nutrition is the key to our wellbeing and overall health.

Using diet to make cancer treatment more effective

Recently, there has been growing evidence supporting the use of a low-carbohydrate/high-fat diet alongside cancer therapies. A new study showcases the potential of using the ketogenic diet to reduce tumour growth effectively.

The study tested cancer-positive mice with a control diet and a ketogenic diet to evaluate the effects on tumour growth and metastasis.

The results showed that the ketogenic diet created an unfavourable environment for tumour cells, preventing the cells from proliferating.

The study’s authors concluded that the ketogenic diet could potentially support cancer therapy as a complementary nutritional approach.

This research could help influence cancer hospitals and oncologists to consider adding a nutrition program alongside their existing treatment offerings.

While permanently following a ketogenic diet can have adverse health effects for cancer patients and healthy individuals, putting the body into a state of ketosis for a short time during chemo- or radiotherapy treatments could help support the effectiveness of the treatments.

Awareness of glucose in our diets and solutions for fuelling the body in a healthy way is an integral part of our cancer solutions. We aim to help people maintain a lifestyle that prevents diseases such as cancer by offering nutritional approaches and innovative technologies, such as an early detection screening program.

We believe the knowledge of the relationship between cancer and nutrition should be available to everyone to help prevent severe cancer cases and aid in a successful recovery.

We are excited by the news of Intelligent Sugar GmbH, a company founded by Dr Johannes Coy, who will soon announce the launch an informative website to share the nutritional benefits of ‘healthy’ sugars, and the harmful effects conventional sugars can have on our bodies.

We look forward to collaborating with Intelligent Sugar to raise awareness around cancer and nutrition.

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