Low Carb Diets & Brain Cancer

March 12, 2008

Despite the pharmaceutical advances in cancer treatment, one of the most promising areas being explored in the fight against cancer is nutrition. Several studies in have been done in which rats have been given different types of brain cancer and then placed on a variety of dietary interventions (high carbohydrates vs. low carbohydrate). A 2007 study published in Nutrition & Metabolism showed that low carbohydrate (ketogenic) diets reduced human brain tumor size in rats between 65 and 35% depending on the type of tumor. The proposed mechanism behind the success of ketogenic diets and brain tumors is that the tumors need glucose to thrive while the brain can function very well on the ketones produced by the body in absence of dietary carbohydrates. For whatever reason this type of dietary intervention has not been studied in humans despite the complete safety of this type of treatment.

Thanks to Alwyn Cosgrove for bringing these studies to my attention.

Written by Mike Roussell · Filed Under Better Health

Mike Roussell is a nationally renowned nutritionist and the president of the Naked Nutrition Network. He is currently a doctoral candidate in nutrition at Pennsylvania State University.