Thursday, October 23, 2008

Understanding Relationship

THE THREE LEVELS OF RELATIONSHIP
A major purpose of relationship is to meet your and your partner’s needs in an expanded way. There are three levels of relationship, that is, three ways that people in a relationship meet their needs. These are selfish love (level one), conditional love(level two), and unconditional love (level three).

Level One: Selfish Love (My needs come first.)
This is the least mature level. At this level, one or both of the partners are focused on meeting their own needs first. When partners have this focus, the relationship is fragile. If you put your needs first, what happens to your partner? Eventually there will be an erosion of trust and togetherness, and there may even be a conflict or dispute about who gets personal needs met first. Do you ever find yourself with your partner in a situation where you are arguing about who is right, who goes first, who gets their way? All of us do sometimes—and when we do, we are playing at relationship level one. At this level, you are rarely together; one of you comes first. Occasionally there may be some way that you can meet your needs together in the same way, but this cannot be sustained. Life doesn’t work that way—there are always points of choice where if you put yourself first, the other person will suffer. Putting the other first is the essence of trust. When two partners fail to understand each other or put each other’s needs first, then trust is being undermined by individual self-interest.

Level Two: Conditional Love (I’ll give you yours if you give me mine.)

We call level two “horse trading.” At this level, every gesture, every gift, every concession or compromise has strings attached. Nothing is given out of free will, only out of a wish for barter, fairness, or personal gain. We call a level two player by the shocking term “whore,” because what does a prostitute do? He or she gives “love” in exchange for money; without money, no “love” is given. In a relationship in which love is exchanged for favors, nothing is simple. Everything is a ploy, a calculation, an advance payment creating debt. It is difficult to accept love because we never know what the price might be. Everything is purchased. In order to avoid debt, both parties insist on creating fairness, that is, a model of even exchange.
However, plans of even exchange will never create the spontaneous self-expression that leads to a passionate relationship. Trust comes not only from following a prescribed plan but also from feeling that if you should suddenly find yourself in need, your partner will come and serve you. Trust comes from the belief that the relationship is always bigger than any individual exchange or temporary advantage or debt of one partner or the other. Again, all relationships devolve to the level once in a while where it seems that things are not equal or fair. When we are at level two, we fall into blaming, suspicion, cautious truces, and exchanges. We hesitate before giving while the other person is waiting for us, in need. When that happens, do not stay at that level: It is crucial to communicate, to make needs understood, and to give to each other.

Level Three: Unconditional Love (The other’s needs come first.)
This is the level where passion and emotional juice flow. Both partners put each other first. When a partner discovers the other’s need, he or she serves that need spontaneously in the best way possible, without calculating a payback. In fact, the partners are constantly studying each other in order to understand how to serve each other better. They become experts at knowing each other’s needs. Both partners recognize that, at a deep level, they love each other unconditionally and that nothing is needed for the love to be expressed. At this level, it is easy to please each other and to share, because even if you don’t experience the same needs as your partner, you can love what he or she loves. You don’t have to worry about your needs
remaining unmet because your partner habitually puts you first—all you have to do is to
give your partner a clue about what you need. At the level of passion, there is enough safety for you to serve each other not only by giving gifts but by penetrating each other emotionally. When there is a foundation of trust, you can express yourselves in darker and naughtier ways to give your relationship a suspenseful edge. Of course, all relationships devolve occasionally. We all have panic moments when we think that we will not be loved or that we will fall short of expectations; in those moments, we will ask for “fair exchange” or will even focus on getting our individual needs met first. However, if the “center of gravity” of your relationship is at level three, you are enjoying one of the rare experiences of life.

Friday, October 17, 2008

HOW DO I CHANGE MY RELATIONSHIP?

By
Dr Leow Chee Seng
MBA (UPM), DBA (UBI), MMIM, MIHRM,MIM-CPT, CAHRP (Consultant),Certified E-Commerce Professional (Mal),Certified Professional Trainer (MIM, PSNB),Certified Stress Management (IACT, USA),Certificate Qualitative Research (Georgia, USA)Certificate in Homeopathy Medicine (Mal)Practising Cognitive, Behavioural Therapist
Relationship is important—it may be the single greatest factor in your happiness throughout your life. It is the way that our emotions become magnified through sharing and interchange. It is the way that we build our histories with others,share memories, and taste our experiences. However, it is not always easy. Why? Because there is another person involved—a person with his or her own experiences, preferences, values, and levels of commitment. This can be frustrating at times, no matter how deep, powerful, intense, and passionate the relationship is.

In fact, you may say, frustration is often a sign of passion waiting to break free—if you can learn how to harness it. As Tony puts it, there are areas in your life where you may enjoy a great deal of control; in other areas of life, you may even have mastery. In relationship, you have neither mastery nor control—you have influence at best. If you think you can control your partner, you will be frustrated. If you simply expect your partner to be or do things in a certain way, your partner will feel judged and stop cooperating. And if you try to coerce your partner to do things in a way that doesn’t reflect his or her free will, you cannot have a happy relationship. So you have influence at best, and you have much less control than you may have thought. Is this bad news? On the contrary, this is the path to the excitement, spontaneity, and interaction that are at the bottom of every truly successful relationship. There is a way to harness the uncertainty of relationship and to let it light up your life. So let’s get started.

FUNDAMENTALS: THE SIX HUMAN NEEDS

The concept of the six human needs is at the core of human needs psychology. We believe that human motivation is driven by the need to fulfill six basic human needs. These needs are our constant and in some ways our closest companions. They never stop driving us and they never go away. You cannot simply resolve a need—it will be back tomorrow or even in five minutes. Our needs are the primal forces that shape all of our choices. The good news is that there are only six needs and there are millions of ways of satisfying your needs. By understanding how your needs work, you can set yourself up for lasting fulfillment in life.

The First Human Need: Certainty/Comfort

The first need is for certainty that we can be comfortable—to have pleasure and to avoid pain. For some of us, this means a secure environment, consistency in our relationships. You can also get certainty through physical habits—eating, for instance, can make you feel comfortable and certain—or even through certain beliefs—for instance, you can have faith that your problems will be resolved. What is necessary for someone to feel certain varies from individual to individual. For one person knowing where the next meal will come from is sufficient certainty, while for another person the need for certainty may be satisfied only by having a million dollars in the bank. Code words for certainty are comfort, security, safety, stability, predictability. When things get rough, what are some things that you do to feel
certain?

The Second Human Need: Uncertainty/Variety

Once we feel certain, however, our second need is for uncertainty—for variety and challenges that will exercise our emotional and physical range. Our bodies, our minds, our emotional being all require uncertainty, exercise, suspense, variety, surprise. Even if you have a lifetime supply of your favorite food, at some point you will want to eat something else. Your emotional and physical state will change. We all value uncertainty/variety to different degrees, but we all need it. You may get variety by pursuing changes, diversions, and pleasures or by undertaking risky projects or challenging commitments. Some people satisfy their need for uncertainty/variety by watching a movie, while others need to race cars or climb mountains. And don’t forget a major source of variety for all of us: problems. When
things don’t go as you planned, when expectations are foiled and things go in a different direction, that’s uncertainty/variety as well. What kind of variety/uncertainty do you experience on a regular basis? Code words for uncertainty are fear, instability, change, variety, chaos, refreshment, craving, release, suspense, exertion, surprise, problem, crisis. Are there ways in which the feeling of uncertainty actually serves to give you variety?

The Third Human Need: Significance

The third need is for significance. Every person needs to feel important, needed, wanted. When we were babies, we all needed to feel that we were number one. If you had siblings, you competed with them for love and attention—you found your niche, whether as the smart one or the scrappy one or the loving one or the obedient one. This need is still with you: Needing to feel special and important in some way has helped shape who you are today. You can feel significant by building or achieving something, or you can feel significant by tearing something or somebody down. In all cases, significance comes from comparing yourself to others— hierarchical pecking orders and superiority/inferiority. In its positive sense, significance leads you to raise your standards. If you overfocus on significance, you will have trouble feeling connected with people, because the comparison game marks out our differences rather than what we have in common. Some people focus on significance in a self-deprecating way—having low self-esteem, doubting whether they are good enough, expecting others to raise them up. How do you get significance? Code words for significance are pride, importance, standards, achievement, performance, perfection, evaluation, discipline, competition, plus any words connected with being “rejected” or being “good enough.”

The Fourth Human Need: Love/Connection

The fourth need is for love and connection. Everyone strives for and hopes for love, and everyone needs connection with other human beings. If you are alive today, you were loved. You needed to feel loved and touched in order to survive, and that need is still at your core. In this sense, love is the ultimate survival instinct, and it comes before the baby can take care of its own basic bodily needs. So love is a big part of who you already are, no matter who you are. The obstacles to love lie in your belief system about how to get the feeling of love, your rules about how to recognize and appreciate love, and your ability to learn to give love as well as receive it. Some people rarely experience love, but they have many ways of feeling connection with others—in the community or in the workplace. Do you experience love in your life, or do you focus on connection with others, a less threatening form of love? When in
your life have you felt really loved? Code words for love and connection are togetherness, unified, connected, passionate, “on the same page.” These first four human needs are the needs of the personality and must be met at some level by everyone. The last two needs are the needs of the spirit, which are essential to human fulfillment. These are growth and contribution.

The Fifth Human Need: Growth
When we stop growing, we die. We need to constantly develop emotionally, intellectually, and spiritually. There is a universal law about growth: Everything is either growing or dying—there is no middle ground. Anything that you want to remain in your life—your money, your body, your relationship, your happiness or love—must be cultivated, developed, expanded. Otherwise it will degenerate. What does this mean for us? There is no “retirement,” a terminal point where we simply get to keep and enjoy what we have. If your body, your finances, or your relationships are in a good state, be prepared to continue to care for and expand them. If you let them flatline, they will deteriorate.

The Sixth Human Need: Contribution

Contribution requires you to go beyond your own needs and give to others. Most emotional problems and sources of pain disappear when you focus on serving someone other than yourself. Therefore, contribution is the human need that effectively regulates your other five needs: If you are focused on contribution, you have the certainty of being able to contribute (there is always a way); you have variety in the number of things that can go right and wrong (contribution is highly interactive); you have significance because the commitment to contribution is rare and is the sign of an extraordinary person; you have connection because there is a spiritual connection in helping others; and you have to experience growth because
contribution requires you to go beyond your own needs. From this perspective, the purpose of human needs psychology is not only to take care of your own needs but to expand and serve others in an attitude of leadership and contribution. If you are focused on growth and contribution, it is difficult to get bored or depressed. Everyone creates their own system of beliefs and actions for satisfying their needs. We call this system their “model of the world.” One person may give himself or herself the feeling of certainty by always controlling the environment, a second person may feel certain by not trusting anyone, and a third person may get the feeling of certainty by holding a spiritual belief. Everyone can meet their own needs in sustainable ways that serve the greater good of themselves and others, or they can meet their own needs in ways that sooner or later harm themselves or others. When someone loses his or her habitual ways of meeting personal needs, he or she experiences a crisis. For instance, when financial failure comes to a businessperson who gets the feeling of significance from being financially successful, he or she will experience a loss of significance. When someone who gets the feeling of importance from taking care of others suddenly becomes unable to help others, he or she will also experience a loss of significance. When people lose their usual ability to meet their needs, they react by trying to find other ways of regaining their sense of significance, at least temporarily. Sometimes these temporary solutions lead to long-term solutions; other times they lead to harm. The purpose of human needs psychology is to understand a person’s model of the world, to bring about a conscious understanding of personal choices, and to assist the person in finding new ways to meet personal needs in ways that will serve him or her and others in the long term.

Thursday, October 16, 2008

THE IMPORTANCE OF NUTRITION BEFORE SURGERY AMONG CANCER PATIENTS

Most cancer patients have as their primary treatment the surgical removal of the tumor. Sometimes this can be a relatively minor procedure, as with a skin cancer, but more often it is complicated, entailing the surgical removal of the cancer and any surrounding lymph nodes. The more complicated and prolonged surgeries can be extremely stressful, both physically and psychologically.

For more than forty years, we have known that malnutrition greatly increases surgical mortality, with malnourished patients being ten times more likely to die soon after surgery.
Most of us think of a malnourished person as looking like someone from Ethiopia. In fact, you can be malnourished and obese at the same time. The new term is undernutritous. It has been shown that people with even a single vitamin deficiency can have a poorly functioning immune system. Looks, indeed, can be deceiving.

A most enlightening study was done some years ago. The study included a careful survey of surgical patients admitted to the hospital and found that 44 percent of the patients had general malnutrition on admission. This means that the patients were malnutritous long before coming to the hospital. Even worse, 75 percent of the patients admitted to an intensive care unit were malnutritous. This put them at an even greater danger because they were under much greater stress. Stress is a tremendous drain on nutrition, and survival depends on nutritional status. Yet even more shocking was the finding that 69 percent of the patients underwent a deterioration in nutritional status while in the hospital, which is an indictment of hospital nutrition.

Another study involving a number of hospitals found that 38 percent of patients had obvious vitamin deficiencies and even a larger percentage were marginally deficient. Patients with mar ginal deficiencies are at a significantly higher risk of complications, especially of poor wound healing and infections.

For cancer patients, not only is wound healing and avoiding all the complications associated with surgery important, but so is making sure the immune system is functioning at peak activity. The status of a person's nutrition is critical to the immune system. Again, I emphasize that even a single nutrient deficiency can severely impair the immune system. For example, a vitamin B6 deficiency alone can lower immunity, even when the levels of all the other vitamins are perfectly normal.

Most bleeding tendencies following surgery are minimal two days after the operation. This means you can safely resume taking your nutritional supplements. The only contraindication would be if you were receiving blood-thinning medications. In that case, I would avoid using vitamin E in doses over 200 in ternational units, even though blood-thinning effects are rare below 1,000 international units. Several supplements can thin the blood (affect coagulation). They include ginkgo, garlic ex tract, quercetin, curcumin, and high-dose vitamin E (greater than 1,000 international units). In general, the blood-thinning effect of these supplements is no more than that of taking one aspirin a day.

Maintaining adequate magnesium levels is especially important in preventing surgical and postsurgical complications. Magnesium is one of those nutrients that seem to have an un limited list of benefits. In addition to playing a role in more than 300 enzymes, it regulates blood flow, protects brain cells, protects the heart muscle, reduces the risk of cardiac arrhythmia, improves lung function, improves kidney function, and prevents one of the most frightening complications of major surgery: blood clots.

I have used magnesium in my neurosurgical patients for more than fifteen years and have never had a patient develop postoperative blood clots in the legs or lungs. In most cases, the blood clot forms in the veins of the legs or pelvis, where it can suddenly enter the bloodstream, producing a fatal clot in the lungs called a pulmonary embolism.

Sudden cardiac arrest can be another catastrophic event during surgery, leaving the patient with a stroke or myocardial in farction (heart attack). Magnesium significantly protects against these complications as well. Several studies have shown that magnesium infusions can reduce the severity of a stroke or heart attack by 50 percent. What is important is that your tissue magnesium level be normal before surgery. An ounce of prevention is truly worth more than a pound of cure.
People who take diuretics or birth control pills, or whose diet is low in fruits and vegetables, are at a very high risk of magnesium depletion. Teenagers often drink large amounts of carbonated soft drinks throughout the day. These drinks significantly lower the tissue magnesium levels. All of these individuals have a higher risk of surgical complications. Magnesium is also essential for normal immune function.

The bottom line is that the better your nutrition is before surgery, the less likely it is that you will have a major complication and the faster, and more completely, you will recover from surgery. Over the years, I have noticed that patients who take these supplements regularly have significantly less pain and fatigue after surgery as well. Postoperative fatigue has always been a problem for patients and one for which surgeons usually have little to offer.


We are becoming increasingly aware of the fact that even nutrient deficiencies too small to be recognized by clinical examination can impair the body's functioning. We call these deficiencies subclinical. A large number of people living in industrialized countries suffer from these subclinical deficiencies, and the number is continuing to grow.

VITAMIN BLOOD LEVELS VERSUS REAL DEFICIENCIES

When doctors want to know if you have adequate amounts of a certain vitamin in your body, they usually draw your blood and have it tested for the vitamin in question. When they want to assess the adequacy of your nutrition in general, they frequently have your blood tested for your folate and vitamin B12 levels. Newer studies, however, have shown this method to be very in accurate. In one study, doctors compared the usual blood levels of the vitamins folate, B6, and B12 to the actual levels in the tissues as measured biochemically. What they discovered was quite shocking.
When they measured the conventional vitamin levels in a group of healthy elderly, they found that approximately 19 per cent of the study subjects had deficiencies. Yet, when they used the more accurate biochemical method, they found that 63 per cent of these same individuals were significantly deficient in one or more of these critical vitamins. A similar comparison of sick elderly subjects found that 60 percent were deficient using conventional measurement and a whopping 83 percent were deficient when the biochemical method was used.

This study clearly demonstrates that measuring vitamin blood levels by the conventional method can result in a false assurance that all is well, when in fact severe deficiencies may exist. This is especially true for the chronically ill.

It is well known that surgery and especially anesthesia are powerful suppressors of immune function. This is especially so for surgeries lasting longer than two hours and in cases where more than a unit of blood is lost during the procedure. This immune suppression can last for several weeks and can be made even worse if the patient has to receive blood during or after the surgery. Immune suppression caused by blood transfusion, especially multiple transfusions, can equal that caused by acquired immune deficiency syndrome (AIDS).

This profound level of immune suppression can give cancer a chance to invade and spread. A combination of poor nutrition, the trauma of surgery, blood transfusion, and anesthesia can temporarily wipe out the immune system. It also puts you at a much higher risk of postoperative wound infection and pneumonia.

It has been shown that this immune suppression caused by surgery, anesthesia, and blood transfusion can be reversed or even prevented by proper nutrition. It will, of course, require special immune stimulants, but it can easily be done.

Of special concern are patients who undergo preoperative chemotherapy-that is, who receive a dose of chemotherapy be fore surgery. It is well recognized that most chemotherapy drugs cause significant immune suppression and interfere with wound healing, thereby significantly increasing the risk of infections after surgery.

Several studies have shown that nutritional immune enhancement can significantly reduce complications, especially infections, following major surgeries. In one study, almost 70 percent of immune-deficient cancer patients undergoing surgery developed postoperative complications as compared to 25 per cent with functioning immune systems. This is a dramatic difference. It should be appreciated that the patients in the group with a functioning immune system did not have specific nutritional immune stimulation. My experience, as well as that of others, is that immunity not only can be restored in patients, but can also be maximized with special supplements.

Food preparation techniques for cancer

Many people have heard that searing meats-that is, cooking meats over an open flame or allowing them to burn-increases the risk of cancer. The presence of powerfully carcinogenic com pounds in seared meat was first discovered in 1977 when mate rial was extracted from the charred surfaces of fish and beef and tested for its ability to mutate genes. The mutagenic compounds are called heterocyclic amines.

When analyzed, these carcinogenic compounds were found to be formed from several chemicals in meat (creatine, certain amino acids, and sugar)." When exposed to high temperatures, these chemicals can form a series of compounds that can dam age the DNA, eventually resulting in cancer.

In one report, high consumption of hot dogs was associated with an almost tenfold increase in the risk of childhood leukemia when compared with low consumption. In another report, maternal consumption of hot dogs and childhood consumption of hamburgers or hot dogs at least once per week were associated with a doubling of the risk of cancers in children. A review of nine studies found an association between consumption by pregnant women of cured meat and the risk of brain cancer in their offspring. These associations do not yet constitute proof that eating hot dogs or hamburgers causes cancer in children, and evidence linking cured meat consumption to childhood cancers remains somewhat inconsistent. In the report studying the effects of eating hot dogs and hamburgers, the association between meat eating and leukemia was weakest among children who took vitamin supplements. Processed meats, such as hot dogs, contain nitrates and nitrites— precursors to carcinogens. Antioxidants found in multivitamins keep nitrates and nitrites from converting into those carcinogens. Therefore, the association between vitamin consumption in children and protection against childhood cancers remains plausible, though unproven.

In general, grilling and panfrying (but not broiling) at high temperatures can produce significant amounts of heterocyclic amines in meats and fish.13 Deep-frying, baking, and roasting meats and fish also produce carcinogens, but in general the amounts are low. Barbecuing produces among the highest levels of heterocyclic amines, especially when done over a grill. Exactly how many of these dangerous compounds are produced depends on the degree of the heat, the cooking time, and if the cooking is done over wood, the type of wood used. The worst type of wood to use is mesquite, which produces large amounts of these carcinogens during cooking. Hardwoods burn cleaner and are less likely to cause a problem.
Heterocyclic amines have been shown to cause cancer in a large number of animal species. While most of the cancers they cause involve the gastrointestinal tract and liver, they can also increase the incidence of tumors in the lungs, breast, and blood vessels, and can produce lymphomas as well. One particularly frightening finding was that even the children of mothers who eat diets containing high levels of these compounds during pregnancy suffer a high risk of cancer later in life.
In one study, researchers found a strong association between a mother's prenatal vitamin C intake and a lower risk of brain tumors in the child.1s In addition, they found that the women in the study who took high doses of folate, multivitamins, and vitamin C and ate the most fruits and vegetables, especially during the first six weeks of pregnancy, had the lowest incidence of brain cancers in their children. Especially frightening was the finding that the children who did not eat any fruit in the first year of life had a 430 percent increased risk of developing a brain cancer, especially of the neuroectodermal type, such as the horrifying medulloblastoma.
There is also evidence that searing the fats in vegetables, such as when panfrying, can increase the production of these cancer causing chemicals. Fortunately, vegetables contain many com pounds that block these carcinogens. For example, green tea, consumed as either a tea or a supplement, has been shown to dramatically reduce the cancer-causing ability of heterocyclic amines.

Another set of compounds found in foods that can increase cancer risk are the nitrite food additives, used as food preservatives. When ingested, they are converted into nitrosamine com pounds, which have been shown to produce cancer in animals and are suspected to do so in humans as well. A diet high in foods containing these preservatives has been recognized as a major risk of stomach cancer and possibly also of other cancers, including brain tumors. The artificial sweetener aspartame is also converted into a mutagen in the stomach by this process. 16
So, what can you do to reduce the danger from seared meats and fish? Most important is to give up eating meats and fish pre pared over an open flame, grilled, or panfried. People from the Deep South may find it difficult to completely give up barbecue. For those times when you may be
tempted to break ranks and sneak a little seared meat or fish, there are a few things you can do to greatly reduce your risk.

Edible plants contain complex chemicals called flavonoids that have been shown to be very efficient at blocking these cancer promoting chemicals. In fact, one way to reduce your risk from nitrites is to take vitamin C with the seared food. The vitamin C will prevent their conversion to nitrosamines.17 Unfortunately, as we shall see, vitamin C also greatly increases iron absorption, something we do not want in the face of cancer.

Fortunately, there is an alternative. Two flavonoids com monly found in vegetables, caffeic acid and ferulic acid, have been shown to powerfully block nitrosamine formation. Caffeic acid is found in plums, apples, and blueberries, while ferulic acid is commonly found in all fruits. Ellagic acid, another flavonoid, is even more powerful-in fact, it is some 80 to 300 times more potent than vitamin C. Ellagic acid is commonly found in straw berries, raspberries, and blackberries.

Sometimes, we like to break the boredom of eating all our meats broiled. Frying can be made much safer through the use of extra virgin olive oil, which contains some powerful antioxidant, anticancer flavonoids. To boost your protection even more, add turmeric to the oil. Several pinches will go a long way toward making your mealtless of a cancer risk. Many spices, such as sage and rosemary, have antibacterial, anti-inflammatory, and anticancer effects.

PREPARING YOUR FOOD

Another problem faced by cancer patients is how to prepare their fruits and vegetables. Some authorities insist that all fruits and vegetables be eaten raw, mainly to preserve the enzymes and prevent a loss of nutrients by heating. While there is some validity to this, I am not an absolutist. Instead, I think you should mix raw and cooked vegetables in your diet.
As I have stated previously, eating raw vegetables limits the amount of the nutritional components you can absorb. This is because they are locked within the cells of the plant by tough cell walls that we can't digest. To unlock the nutrients, you need to chew your vegetables until they are mush, cook them, or liquefy them in a blender.
The problem with the first option-chewing to a fine mush is that most people are not that patient. Most people chew a few times and then swallow. Furthermore, some studies have shown that chewing vegetables allows only 30 percent of the nutrients to he absorbed. This means you have to eat a lot more vegetables to get the full amount of the nutrients. Using a blender or juicer releases about 90 percent of the nutrients. The other advantage is that you are consuming raw fruits and vegetables.

So, what about cooking? Will it destroy all the nutrients? Careful studies have shown that it varies with the food type. A considerable loss of anticancer (antimutagenic) activity was seen when the following foods were heated: apples, apricots, kiwi, pineapple, beets, cabbage, cauliflower, leafy lettuce, cucumber, onions, radishes, and rubarb.

Foods that maintained their anticancer power when cooked included blackberries, blueberries, sweet and sour cherries, honey dew melons, plums, strawberries, Brussels sprouts, chicory greens, eggplant, garden cress, pumpkin, and spinach.

Cooking vegetables in tap water has two disadvantages. First, most of a vegetable's water-soluble nutrients-such as its minerals, B vitamins, and ascorbate-are lost in water. Second, if the water is fluoridated, the amount of fluoride in the water becomes more and more concentrated as the water evaporates until a very concentrated solution of fluoride remains. The fluoride, being a very reactive chemical, will then bind with the vegetable and cannot be washed off. Fluoride is a carcinogenic compound.

When cooking vegetables, either steam them or cook them in extra virgin olive oil. I say cook, but actually you should just heat them in a pan for a few minutes. This will break down some of the plant cells, but not as thoroughly as when you fully cook the vegetable. If you use distilled water to cook your vegetables, you can drink the juices, since they will contain a high concentration of nutrients. Southerners call this pot liquor.

When it comes to fruits and vegetables, keep the following important points in mind:
● Eat a mixture of raw and cooked vegetables based on the above heat stability information.
● Always eat vegetables when you eat meat. The flavonoids in the vegetables will neutralize the carcinogens in the meat, especially in seared meats. They will also reduce the absorp tion of iron, so that you absorb only enough to maintain your body's needs.
● Eat only a small amount of fruit a day, preferably no more than half a cup. Eat the fruit only after you have finished a meal. This prevents hypoglycemia, a sudden drop in blood sugar, which can be quite severe in some people. (Until your cancer is under control, I would recommend avoiding fruits altogether.)
● If you cook your vegetables in water, use only distilled water or water purified by a reverse osmosis filter.
Keep the following points in mind about food in general:
● Avoid red meats such as beef and pork, which are high in two powerful cancer promoters. Choose chicken orr turkey that has been minimally processed and has not been painted or injected with broth, hydrolyzed protein, or other mono sodium glutamate (MSG)-containing products. Also, if using chicken, remove the skin and wash the meat thoroughly, since most chicken is sprayed with chlorine bleach at the processing plant.
● Avoid all commercially prepared foods. Try to make all your foods from fresh ingredients. Do not use commercial sauces, mixes, or seasonings unless they are made with pure herbs or spices.
● Avoid cow's milk, cheese, and other milk-based products, especially if low in fat. Low-fat milk products have a higher concentration of glutamate (an excitotoxin). In addition, milk allergies, which can be subtle, will impair your immune system. Allergies to milk are some of the most common food allergies.
● Avoid foods containing aspartame, MSG, hydrolyzed vegetable protein, soy protein, or the additive carrageenan. Carrageenan, commonly used in ice cream and baked goods, is an especially powerful promoter of cancer growth and spread. The name will be listed on the product label. Also, avoid all of the newer sweeteners, since they have not been adequately tested for safety. Sweet'N Low can be used, but only in limited amounts. Stevia can also be used
● While in today's world this can be very difficult, try to avoid all foods and drinks in plastic containers, especially if the plastic has a pungent odor. Plastic releases estrogenic-like compounds, which can promote estrogen-sensitive cancers such as breast cancer, colon cancer, some brain tumors, renal cancers, and possibly prostate cancer. If possible, use only glass containers. Granted, these are harder and harder to come by.
● Avoid sugar, no matter what the source. Honey is sugar. Sure, there are a few flavonoids included, but it is still sugar and can be used by the cancer. Fructose, while it does not promote insulin release, is not a good choice. For one thing, it increases the free radical damage to cells, thereby increasing the risk of cancer.
● Avoid fruit juices. While fruit juices contain many anti cancer flavonoids and vitamins, especially folate, they also are high in sugar and many have high levels of fluoride. This is especially true for most commercial grape juices.
Excitotoxins, such as MSG and hydrolyzed protein, can cause nausea, diarrhea, and stomach cramping, especially in people who are undergoing, or who have undergone, chemotherapy or radiation treatments." In addition, they can cause irregularities of the heart beat (arrhythmia). This is important when taking chemotherapy drugs that are known to damage the heart, such as adriamycin, daunorubicin, Ara-C, Doxorubicin, Mitoxantrone, cyclophosphamide, and Taxol.

JUICING AND BLENDERIZING YOUR FRUITS AND VEGETABLES

As I discussed previously, one of the best ways to release the 10,000 phytonutrients in fruits and vegetables is to mechanically break open the cells.
Most people have heard of juicing. Juicing entails loading fruits and vegetables into a machine that grinds them up, sepa rating the juice from the pulp, which is usually discarded. As many people who have tried juicing know, it takes a countertop of vegetables to make one 10-ounce glass of juice. I always feel that by throwing away all that vegetable bulk, we discard im portant nutrients and phytochemicals-which, in fact, we do. In addition, there is the cleanup. With many juicing ma chines, this is a daunting task, to say the least. After each use, you have to take the machine apart, clean it thoroughly, lubricate its parts, and reassemble it. To do that even twice a day usually discourages most people, especially if they have busy lives. Shop around when looking for a juicing machine. Some are much easier to use and maintain than others.

Despite the cleanup necessitated by many juicing machines, however, it has been obvious to me that this process of mechanically breaking down fruits and vegetables is responsible for more miraculous cures of advanced cancers than any other thing people can do. But if you truly do not have the time to de vote to cleaning up a juicing machine, there is a wonderful alternative: the vegetable blender.

Vegetable blenders have two real advantages over juicers. First, they do not waste anything. In addition to the thousands of nutrients inside them., plants contain numerous, often powerful phytochemicals on the outside of their leaves and stems. Among these phytochemicals are glycoproteins and polysaccha rides, which regulate immunity. Furthermore, plant pulp contains a lot of fiber. Second, vegetable blenders are a snap to clean. Not any blender will do, however. Rather, the machine must be powerful enough to turn vegetables and fruits into liquids. The vegetable blender that I have in my kitchen is the Vita-Mix 5000.
When juicing or blenderizing fruits or vegetables, of even more importance than using the right machine is choosing the right ingredients. In addition, you need to thoroughly clean the fruits and vegetables with a vegetable wash before putting them in the machine.

One of the common mistakes people make when preparing juice is using only their favorite vegetables or fruits, usually based on taste. For example, many people use only carrots. They will drink carrot juice until they turn orange-not that turning or ange is bad, even though it may attract rabbits.

Using only one vegetable, such as carrots, is wrong for two reasons. First, some vegetables are very high in sugar, which, as we have seen, can stimulate tumor growth. Second, you miss important phytochemicals found in other plants. Some special anticancer flavonoids are found only in certain vegetables and not others. Only by mixing various types of vegetables can you take full advantage of these potent anticancer chemicals.

For example, onions, teas, and apples contain a powerful cancer inhibitor called quercetin. Parsley and celery contain an anticancer flavonoid called apigenin, while green tea has a series of chemicals, including epigallocatechin gallate, catechin, and epicatechin, that not only suppress tumors, but also protect the heart and blood vessels. The more of these vegetables you mix together, the more likely your cancer will be either suppressed or eliminated, especially if you combine this dietary therapy with conventional treatments.

Something I often do personally is to make myself a salad with a large variety of vegetables, but instead of eating it, I throw it into my vegetable blender, blenderize it, and drink it. That way, I get a much higher intake of the salad's healthful phytochemicals than if I simply ate it. I find I can juice my salad and drink it quicker than I could just eat it in the normal way.

To blenderize or juice vegetables, first clean them thoroughly with a vegetable wash, then put them in the machine. Add a cup of distilled water and process on a low setting. Slowly increase the speed to full. Most machines have a special power switch that significantly boosts the speed; turn this switch on for a few seconds several times during the mixing procedure. You can keep adding water until the mixture is a consistency you can drink.

When preparing your own salad to drink, choose at least five vegetables from the list below. If possible, use all the vegetables on the list. In general, especially when first starting your conventional therapy, avoid fruits, or at least use just a mini mum amount. If you wish, empty the contents of a multivitamin capsule into the blender as well and mix with the juice. Some vitamins are bitter and can affect the taste; experiment until you find a good balance.

For people who do not eat enough fiber, drinking vegetables may cause diarrhea or bloating. To avoid these effects, first start off with a dilute solution of vegetable juice-a good combination is half vegetable juice and half distilled water. Drink this for a week. Slowly increase the percentage of vegetable juice and decrease the percentage of water, until you are drinking almost 100 percent juice. (You may still need water just for consistency's sake.) Drink one 10-ounce glass of vegetable juice twice a day. What to Include in Your Fresh Juice
Vegetables
Beets Kale
Broccoli Parsley
Brussels sprouts Purple cabbage
Carrots Spinach
Cauliflower Tomatoes
Celery Turnip greens

FRESH VERSUS FROZEN JUICE

One of the major controversies regarding juicing or blenderizing fruits and vegetables is whether the juice needs to be consumed right away or can be stored in the refrigerator. Both sides have good arguments. Purists say that only freshly made juice is effective, since it preserves the enzymes. This means you would have to make juice twice daily.

The problem is that some people just don't have the time or desire to prepare fresh juice twice a day. Over time, they stop doing it altogether. In reality, many enzymes are preserved if the juice is kept cold in the refrigerator. Enzyme survival and activity are temperature dependent. Add heat, and they will quickly be destroyed.

For cancer patients who are unable to make juice daily, I suggest preparing a large batch over the weekend, when most people have more time. Freeze half of the juice and keep about a three-day supply available in the refrigerator for immediate use. Another option is to divide the prepared juice into daily amounts and keep all but a day's supply in the freezer. You just have to remember to thaw out your day's supply every morning. When juice is frozen, all of its phytonutrients and enzymes are pre served.

Nutrient depletion among cancer

In addition to a poor diet, there are many things we do, such as smoking and taking medications, that can severely affect our nutrition. Smoking has been shown to dramatically lower the level of vitamin C in the tissues. Even secondhand smoke can have this effect. For some as-yet-unexplained reason, smokers cannot improve their vitamin C levels unless they take very high doses of the vitamin every day. To reach normal tissue levels of vitamin C, they need to take a minimum of 500 mil ligrams daily. In addition, smokers have significantly lowered beta-carotene levels. One study found that flavonoid intake, a reflection of fruit and vegetable consumption, was 21 percent lower in smokers than in nonsmokers. Taken together, these facts may explain why smokers have a much higher incidence of lung cancer (from among all cancers) than nonsmokers. It also means that when smokers begin treatment for cancer, they are less likely to respond well and are more likely to suffer serious complications.

One of the biggest culprits in depleting nutrition is taking a medication over a long period of time. Numerous medications can severely lower the body levels of critical vitamins and minerals. For example, oral contraceptives lower the levels of vita min C, folate, riboflavin, vitamin B6, vitamin B12, magnesium, selenium, and the amino acid tyrosine (which is critical to brain function). As we have seen, low vitamin C levels in women can increase their risk of cervical cancer by tenfold. One study found that vitamin C levels may be lowered by as much as 30 percent in women taking birth control pills.

Chronically low levels of folate have been shown to increase the risk of numerous cancers, especially cancer of the cervix, breast, and colon.10 Antiseizure medications, blood pressure medications, and antiulcer medications can also dramatically lower folate levels. One type of antidiabetic medication, the biguanides, can significantly deplete folate as well. Millions of people have been taking these medications every day for decades.

We now know that chronically ill people are much more likely to develop cancer than healthier people and that one of the reasons for this may be the prolonged nutritional depletion caused by both their illness and their medication.

Many medications, even when taken alone, can cause depletion of numerous nutrients. As already stated, oral contraceptives deplete a number of essential nutrients. Another group of notorious culprits is the antihypertensive medications used to control blood pressure. These medications have been shown to cause deficiencies in vitamin B6, calcium, zinc, magnesium, CoQ10, ascorbate, thiamine, and vitamin K.

Of special concern to cancer patients is the effect of medications on lowering the body's supply of CoQ10, a powerful antioxidant, supplier of cellular energy, and cancer preventative. It has been shown that virtually all cancer patients have low CoQ10 levels and that raising these levels significantly improves these patients' chances of survival.11 Of the medications known to deplete CoQ10 levels in the body, the most commonly used include:
● Most cholestrol-lowering drugs, referred to as statins
● Blood pressure medications, such as the hydralazines, thi azides, beta-blockers, clonidine, and methyldopa
● Antidiabetic drugs, such as the sulfanylureas and biguanides
● Phenothiazines and tricyclics, which are antinausea medications and types of antidepressants
The drugs used to lower cholesterol, the so-called statin drugs, have been known. for some time to cause dramatic deficiencies in CoQ10 levels. Tens of millions of people who take these drugs, usually for life, are never told of this very serious side effect. These drugs also deplete other nutrients, such as beta-carotene, folate, and vitamins A, B12, D, E, and K, as well as calcium, magnesium, zinc, and phosphate.

Magnesium depletion is a special problem with certain chemotherapy drugs, such as cisplatin. In fact, magnesium levels can fall to dangerously low levels, leading to cardiac and brain damage. Many commonly used prescription drugs deplete magnesium as well. Women who have taken birth control pills for decades often have severely low tissue magnesium stores. When they develop cancer, their chemotherapy treatments are much more haz ardous and likely to produce complications than those of women with normal magnesium tissue levels. This problem is rarely considered by oncologists.

It has been shown that patients going into chemotherapy and radiation treatments with good nutrition are far less likely to suffer complications, respond better to the treatments, and have a lower risk of dying during the treatment than do people with a poor nutritional status. This has been confirmed in experimental settings.

In one experiment, it was found that when rats were given cyclophosphamide alone and were operated on alone, they rarely died, but when they were given the two treatments combined, more than 75 percent died. When the rats were treated with vitamin A or beta-carotene before surgery, the mortality rate was reduced to zero-that is, none of the rats died.

So, it is fairly obvious that there are a number of things you can do immediately to boost the effectiveness of your cancer treatments. First, do not smoke and avoid being in enclosed areas where others are smoking. Not only does tobacco contain numerous carcinogens, but the nicotine in tobacco-even in the form of the nicotine patches used to stop smoking-is a rather powerful inhibitor of the immune system. The last thing you want to do is further suppress your immune system.
Second, if you have been taking medications known to lower the levels of vitamins, minerals, or CoQ10, take supplements to correct the deficiencies in order to remain on the medications. Check with your doctor to see which medications you can dis continue. In many cases, doctors are either not aware that their patients are still on inappropriate medications or they have for gotten they prescribed the medications. It is your responsibility to review your medications with your doctor on a regular basis. Finally, take a magnesium supplement. This is one supplement rarely suggested by conventional doctors. It is particularly important to supplement with this mineral since deficiencies are so common, even in healthy people. For example, one survey of more than 30,000 people found that 75 percent were deficient in magnesium intake, with two-thirds of these people drastically deficient. People taking diuretic medications are at special risk, since these medications not only wash out potassium, but also remove magnesium. Fortunately, vegetables are high in magnesium.

Nutrient Interaction for Cancer

This brings us to another important topic: nutrient interaction. Medical science has, for far too long, treated nutrients as just more objects to explore. In their way of thinking, which is very archaic, if you want to know why something works-for example, why fruits and vegetables can reduce the risk of cancer you simply extract the components found in the highest concentrations and test them. Citrus fruits have a lot of vitamin C, so to the popular way of thinking, you just give test animals and people lots of vitamin C and see if it works. Sometimes it does, sometimes it has no effect, and on rare occasions, it actually increases the growth of cancer.

The problem with this way of thinking is that nutrients do not normally work alone, especially in as complex a biological system as exists in people. To a large part, this is because of the interactions of the biochemical systems, where altering one part of the system may affect a dozen or more other parts of the sys tern. Another important consideration is that the nutrients them selves interact. This is especially true when dealing with anticancer effects.

One of the more powerful interactions between nutrients and anticancer effects is seen with vitamin E and selenium. Several animal studies as well as studies of large populations of women have shown that vitamin E reduces the risk of breast cancer, especially in women at very high risk of the disease. But when you add selenium to the vitamin E, an even greater lowering of the risk is seen.

If we look at whole fruits and vegetables, we notice that vitamins never occur alone. This is very important, since vitamins keep each other from oxidizing. Vitamin C protects vitamin E, beta-carotene protects vitamin C, and so on. Recent studies emphasize the importance of mixing these nutrients in our diet and as supplements.

To emphasize the importance of nutrient interaction, let us look at the Physicians' Health Study, which involved 22,071 doctors, making it one of the largest nutritional studies ever done. The researchers isolated 578 men with prostate cancer in the study group and compared their diets to those of 1,294 con trols. They found that the men with the highest blood levels of lycopene, the red pigment in tomatoes, had a dramatically lower incidence of prostate cancer, especially of the very aggressive type; some had as much as a 60 percent lower incidence. Yet, beta-carotene had no effect on the risk of the disease-at least, not in the men with normal levels of lycopene. To the re searchers' surprise, beta-carotene did have a major effect on re ducing the prostate cancer risk if a man's lycopene level was low. This, once again, emphasizes the interrelationship between nutrients and anticancer effects,

Special Cancer Killers in Plants

While most people think of vitamins as antioxidants and as the major nutritional weapons against cancer, other plant chemicals are, in fact, infinitely more powerful. Of major interest to cancer researchers are the flavonoids, a group of 5,000 very complex chemicals. Like vitamins, they also work best when together. A single vegetable or fruit can contain hundreds of these chemi cals. In addition, their anticancer activity is further enhanced by the presence of vitamins.

There is growing evidence that the effectiveness of nutrients when combined is not only additive, but synergistic. An additive effect is two plus two equals four, whereas a synergistic effect is two plus two equals twelve or twenty. Not only do certain nutrients enhance each other's anti cancer activity, they also dramatically enhance the ability of anti cancer drugs and radiation to kill cancer cells, as we shall see later.

Not All Foods Are Created the Same

One factor that is rarely considered is the nutritional variation among foods. For example, we often hear that apples are a good food for preventing cancer. Yet, all apples are not the same in terms of cancer-preventing abilities. One of the known anti cancer constituents in apples is a chemical called chlorogenic acid, yet the content of chlorogenic acid varies considerably among the different species of apples, with the McIntosh containing a very high level and the Golden Delicious a very low level.

Whether a fruit or vegetable is vine ripened also makes a dif ference. Many fruits and vegetables found in our local market were shipped across the country. To keep produce from spoiling during shipping, the produce companies pick the plants before they ripen, which means that these fruits and vegetables have lower concentrations of nutrients. Sometimes young sprouts have a greater concentration of a particular beneficial nutrient than the fully matured vegetable. For example, broccoli sprouts have been shown to have as much as 100 times more indole-3 carbinol, a powerful inhibitor of breast cancer, than mature br.occoli.9 Several nutritional companies have taken advantage of this observation by offering numerous types of plant sprouts, such as wheat, rye, and barley.

Not all vegetables and fruits have the same cancer-fighting power. The produce with the greatest anticancer effect are the cruciferous vegetables, which include kale, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower, and cabbage.

This is not to say that other vegetables are of no help because beets, parsley, spinach, carrots, and tomatoes have all been shown to have equally powerful anticancer effects. In general, fruits and vegetables with deep colors have the greatest anti cancer effectiveness.

Most people are aware that our soil-the sole source of nutrients for plants-is terribly depleted of nutrients. For example, the soil in many areas of the United States is severely depleted of the mineral selenium. People eating vegetables grown in selenium depleted soil can develop severe selenium deficiencies, thereby greatly increasing their risk for certain cancers, including breast and prostate cancers. Selenium plays a major role in immune system function as well, especially in the immune cells that attack cancer.

The quality of supplementary product for cancer

One question I am frequently asked concerns whether synthetic vitamins or natural vitamins are better. In most cases, the natural vitamin is better, yet some synthetic vitamins are converted into numerous metabolic breakdown products when absorbed and these products can have powerful anticancer effects of their own. This has been shown to be the case with synthetic beta- carotene, which can be converted into numerous other com pounds.

A recent study of commonly available forms of synthetic beta carotene supplements found that many often contain no beta carotene at all, only the breakdown products of beta-carotene.' This doesn't mean that these supplements are ineffective against cancer, since in animal tests these breakdown products were also effective against cancer.

In some instances, vitamins compete for absorption from the gastrointestinal tract. For example, synthetic beta-carotene interferes with the absorption of another very important carotenoid called lutein.7 Similarly, synthetic vitamin E in high doses can lower the blood levels of beta-carotene. This competition for absorption can have major consequences for the person with cancer. Lutein, for example, is more important in preventing lung cancer and possibly breast cancer than is beta-carotene. In addition, taking beta-carotene from natural sources, such as from the algae Dunaliella bardawil or salina, results in much higher levels of the cars otenoids than does taking synthetic forms of the vitamin

Another problem with taking synthetic vitamins is that many natural vitamins consist of a number of components, whereas the synthetic forms have only one form. For example, vitamin E is actually composed of eight different fractions (alpha, beta, gamma, and delta tocopherols, and four tocotrienols), with some having more anticancer activity than others. The same is true for the carotenoids. While most people are familiar with beta-carotene, some of the other forms of the carotenoids are significantly more potent against specific cancers. Alpha-carotene, for instance, has been shown to play a more important role in preventing breast cancer, and lutein, beta-cryptoxanthin, and lycopene may be more important in preventing ovarian, prostate, and lung cancers.8 Astaxanthin, another carotenoid, has been found to strongly inhibit bladder cancer. If you take only synthetic beta-carotene, you will miss all of these powerful anti cancer carotenoids.
Even when taking synthetic vitamins, you should always try to use the form that most closely resembles the one found in nature or that has been shown to have a special anticancer effect, such as vitamin E succinate. Following are some guidelines.

Use the ascorbate form of vitamin C and not ascorbic acid. The acid form is more likely to upset your stomach, is poorly absorbed, and must be converted in your body to be used. Taking higher doses of ascorbic acid can cause acid build up (acidosis) and can increase your risk of osteoporosis. The best forms are magnesium ascorbate and calcium ascorbate. I prefer the former.
Never use vitamin E acetate (which is also called d- or dl alpha-tocopheryl acetate). This form of vitamin E is poorly absorbed, can cause a loss of carotenes in the liver, does not enter the brain, and has very little, if any, anticancer effect. The most powerful form of vitamin E is vitamin E succinate, which is also known as d-alpha-tocopheryl succinate or dry E. It comes as a white powder in a capsule. As we shall see, this form of vitamin E has the most powerful effect against cancer.

The second-best form of vitamin E for the cancer patient is the natural form, which is also called mixed tocopherols. In most cases, the supplement contains four types of tocopherols: alpha, beta, gamma, and delta. Technically, vitamin E also includes four other types of components, called tocotrienols, which include alpha, beta, gamma, and delta forms. Recent research has shown that the tocotrienols have powerful cancer-inhibiting effects, especially when combined with certain anticancer drugs, such as tamoxifen.

Many vitamin E supplements come in a gelatin capsule mixed with oil. In most cases, this oil is one of the tumor growth-promoting oils, usually soybean oil. This is another reason to take only vitamin E succinate, a dry powder. Unfortunately, no one has produced a vitamin E supplement dissolved in extra virgin olive oil.

Multiple vitamins should be taken only as a powder in a capsule and not as a hard tablet. Many tablets have been shown to contain binders that can prevent the absorption of the vitamins. Binders are like glue, used by manufacturers to keep the tablets from breaking during shipping. The ease with which a tablet can be broken down is of special concern for people who have undergone chemotherapy or radiation, since many have poor digestive abilities.
In general, avoid supplements that contain aspartate, glycine, or amino acid chelates-the so-called chelated vitamins or minerals. While they claim to improve absorption, and many do, these amino acids are excitotoxins. Excitotoxins not only can damage the brain, but some individuals have an extreme sensitivity to them. Granted, they are present in small doses, but for a person with a brain tumor, they might stimulate the tumor to grow faster.

You should also avoid gelatin capsules as much as possible, since gelatin is very high in glutamate, a powerful excitotoxin. In addition, gelatin is a bovine product and therefore carries a risk of mad cow disease.

Beware when buying plant extracts-that is, supplements containing extracts of fruits or vegetables. Many of these supplements contain such low amounts of the extract that you gain little nutritional benefit. This is a problem with vitamin C brands that claim rose hips as an ingredient. In truth, most of these brands have only a trace of rose hips, nowhere near enough to have any benefit, but enough to jack up the price.

Buy only fruit or vegetable extracts that come either as a loose powder or as a powder in a capsule. The label should list the amount of each ingredient. Note that these products require freeze drying or low-temperature drying to preserve the phyto chemicals. None of the brands I have examined are complete, and none should be used in place of a multivitamin-and-mineral supplement. Most are also low in magnesium. Do not buy a vegetable supplement that comes as a hard tablet with little flecks of green or red, since most such products are worthless.

Another common problem is supplements that come as a dry powder or tablet, but that are, in fact, absorbed only when dis solved in oil. Unfortunately, the label never tells you this. For in stance, coenzyme Q10 (CoQ10), a very important anticancer nutrient, is absorbed poorly as a dry powder. It is fat-soluble and best absorbed when dissolved in an oil. One solution is to dissolve the powder in extra virgin olive oil. Just empty the capsule in a tablespoon of oil and take it as you would medicine. It has very little taste.
I have found several supplements in this category. Many of the flavonoids, such as curcumin, quercetin, and hesperidin, are better absorbed in an oil base as well. (At least one manufac turer makes water-soluble forms of quercetin and hesperidin that do not need to be dissolved in oil.) Often, failure to address the solubility issue explains why supplements do not seem to work for some people.

Finally, we must deal with the issues of quality and price. Many people shop for supplements the way they shop for toilet tissue, choosing whichever is the cheapest brand. This is like buying spoiled food to save money. In many cases, the brands with the highest quality cost more, sometimes significantly more. This does not always hold true, however, because occa sionally some worthless brands have high prices.

The only way to tell is to take a close look at the manufacturer. Some will hold a pharmaceutical manufacturer's license, which requires the company to pass rigorous standards and meticulous examinations of its manufacturing methods. Others sell their products to university laboratories and therefore must meet certain standards of quality and purity.

While the length of time a company has been in business and its size are major considerations, some smaller, younger companies make very high quality products. Most supplement companies keep records showing the analysis profiles of their supplements. These are available to health food stores and pharmacies. You should ask to look at the analysis of any supplement in question.
Quality is especially important in patients undergoing chemotherapy or radiation treatments because often they have difficulty absorbing nutrients. How a supplement is manufactured makes a great deal of difference. For example, most supplement manufacturers add what is called an excipient to their products. One of the most commonly used is magnesium stearate, which has been shown to reduce nutrient absorption by more than 60 percent, even when used in a capsule. Other excipients are ascorbylpalmitate and stearic acid, both of which cause the same absorption problem.

Supplements can also be coated with a substance to make them easier to swallow. This coating is, in fact, nothing more than shellac, just like the kind used on furniture. Some companies use none of these additives and instead utilize a process that preserves the quality and purity of the product, maximizing absorption.

Herbs are in a special category all their own. Unlike most plants, herbs contain powerful chemicals that have pharmaceutical effects. The amounts of these chemicals in an herb depends on the soil the herb was grown in, the climate of the area, the moisture of the soil, and even the time of day the plant was harvested. When making large batches of herbal supplements, manufacturers must use exacting methods to make sure each capsule has the same amount of active ingredient.

To be sure your herbal supplement has the right amount of the active ingredient, check the label for standardization information. For example, a ginkgo biloba label should say the product is standardized to 24 percent heterosides and 6 percent ter penes. This guarantees that each capsule contains at least these amounts of active ingredients. The best protection is to only buy herbal products that have "Guaranteed Potency Herb" written on the label. This assures you of a very high standard herb. Never buy cheap herbs.

THE COMPLEXITY OF NUTRITION ON CANCER

Most people outside science think that nutrition is simply a matter of what you eat and that what is important is that you get enough in the way of the basic food groups and calories. In fact, nutrition is much more complex than that. First, we have to understand the purpose of eating. It is not to satisfy our taste buds or to keep our stomachs from growling from hunger, even though many in the industrialized world think this way. Second, we have to understand that the body is a collection of immensely complex chemical reactions-tens of thousands of them.

Our cells and tissues are not simple cellular organisms living together in harmony. They are extremely complex biochemical laboratories engaging in tens of thousands of biochemical reactions every second of our lives. These chemical. reactions require special types of substances that must be supplied to our cells for them to function normally. Fortunately, our bodies can adapt to many deficiencies in these chemicals and can even make substitutions. Yet, these deficiencies can cause the cells to work less efficiently, making them highly susceptible to diseases, including cancer.

The nutritional requirements for cells also vary widely, with some cells requiring more of a particular nutrient than other cells. This is because the cells have different functions. For ex ample, the thyroid gland needs a different set of chemicals than does breast tissue.
We have also learned that the distribution of vitamins and their breakdown products varies considerably from tissue to tissue. For example, the female cervix concentrates more vita min C and folate than does the gallbladder. This should mean that a deficiency in vitamin C and folate will increase a woman's risk of cervical cancer, and that is exactly what we sec. Women with very low vitamin C intake can have a cervical cancer risk ten times higher than women who consume more dietary vitamin C.

In some instances, a tissue may require a lot more of a par ticular nutrient than normal, as for instance in the case of cervical cancer where even normal blood levels of folate are insufficient to prevent the disease. It takes higher intakes of folate to prevent cervical cancer in women at high risk. This is one of the reasons why the recommendations for the vitamins and minerals are constantly being revised upward.

Sometimes a person can be eating a perfectly healthy diet, with lots of fruits and vegetables, low amounts of harmful fats, and little sugar, and still have a high risk of cancer. One reason for this is that unless the nutrients can enter the bloodstream, they do little good. We call this inability to enter the bloodstream malabsorption. Occasionally, malabsorption involves only a single type of nutrient or even a single vitamin or mineral. So how can we know if we are absorbing our nutrients properly? One way is to have our blood levels of the nutrients measured directly. Several laboratories measure vitamin and mineral blood levels. Yet, even then we may be fooled. Many vitamins are converted from the form found in food into an especially active form required by the cells in the body. For example, the riboflavin from food is converted into riboflavin-S-phosphate in the body, and the pyridoxine (vitamin B6) from food is converted into pyrodoxal-S-phosphate in the body. The conversion processes for these vitamins require special enzymes, which are often impaired in the elderly, in people undergoing cancer treatments, and in people suffering from a chronic disease.

Supplement Vs Food in cancer

Many health practitioners who treat cancer with alternative methods insist that no supplements are needed, only pure, healthy foods, while others disagree and promote the use of supplements. Personally, I see a third way: a program based principally on dietary changes and whole foods plus the use of specially selected supplements that have shown particular activity against cancer. My selection of supplements is based on hard science and numerous clinical studies, as well as in my own personal experience. For example, we now know that the anticancer activity of the different forms of vitamin E varies considerably. Some forms of vitamin E, such as d- or dl-alpha-tocopheryl acetate, have very little anticancer activity, are poorly absorbed, and may in terfere with other nutrients, while the d-alpha-tocopheryl succinate form of vitamin E has powerful anticancer activity, is well absorbed, and has the greatest antioxidant activity. The same can also be said for synthetic beta-carotene compared to natural forms.

We should also appreciate that we still do not know all the components in edible plants, nor do we understand many of the functions of the food components that have been isolated. By using only extracts of these plants, we may be missing an as-yet unidentified anticancer nutrient. In addition, the process of extracting the known nutrients could destroy some of the mysterious component.

One of the big mysteries of nutritional cancer treatments is why it takes so many fruits and vegetables in the diet to have any anticancer effect. Ten servings of fruits and vegetables add up to a lot of produce. Closely connected to this mystery is the difference between the cells of animals and the cells of plants. Most of the nutritious components of plants are confined within their cells, which differ from animal cells in that they have tough cell walls surrounding their membranes. Unfortunately, humans do not have enzymes in their digestive tracts to dissolve these cell walls. As a result, we cannot absorb most of the nutrients in plants.

This leaves us with three ways to extract these locked-in nutrients. First, we can mechanically break the cell walls by chewing all our fruits and vegetables until they are fine mush. Un fortunately, most of us chew our fruits and vegetables just a few times and then swallow. Second, we can cook our fruits and vegetables, since the heating process breaks the cell wall down. The disadvantage of this method is that you also destroy some of the nutrients and wash others away. In addition, you neutralize many of the plant enzymes, which have been shown to play a part in the anticancer effects of plants. Finally, we can me chemically break down the cell walls by either juicing our fruits and vegetables or liquefying them in a blender.

I have been impressed by the number of people with advanced, near-terminal cancer who have survived after changing their diet to include blenderized or juiced fruits and vegetables. With what we know now concerning the science behind plant phytochemicals and cancer, it makes a lot of sense. People who juice or blenderize their fruits and vegetables get a much higher concentration of the anticancer chemicals than those who just eat fruits and vegetables. In addition, most of the people who go to this trouble choose fruits and vegetables that are high on the list of the most powerful edible anticancer plants.

As we shall see throughout this book, many phytochemicals have a differential effect in that they protect normal cells from the harmful effects of chemotherapy and radiation treatments while greatly enhancing the effectiveness of the conventional treatments against the cancer.

Important to understand cancer process

In the past, before we understood why nutrition works, most of our information was based on anecdotal stories (case histories), studies of large populations of people (epidemiological studies), and word of mouth from those utilizing nutritional treatments outside the medial establishment. This presented two major problems. First, physicians hesitated to use nutrition because little proof or explanation existed for its mechanism of action. Second, cancer patients were often afraid to rely on a treatment method that was not endorsed by the scientific community.

Despite the tens of billions of dollars spent on the war on cancer, we have not found a cure for the disease, but we have learned a lot about the cancer process and how cancer cells differ from normal cells. It is this basic knowledge that elucidated for us what many early proactioners of alternative medicine knew all along: something in plants, both as foods and as herbs, has a beneficial effect in suppressing cancer growth.

It should also be appreciated that much of the scientific work was done in an experimental setting. While thousands of cancer patients have been treated successfully with nutritional treatments, few carefully controlled studies of these large populations of patients have been properly done, This is because such studies are very expensive and no one, until recently, has taken an interest in funding them. Recently, the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has begun several studies of the nutritional treatment of cancers in large numbers of people. It will be several more years before the final results of these studies appear.

For the cancer patient, waiting for the results of academic studies is not an option. I have used nutritional methods for at least twenty-four years, more so in the last five years, and I have seen undeniable benefits-and no harm-in my patients. There is no question that the patients using these methods tolerate their treatments better and have far fewer complications. They also respond much better to their conventional treatments.

As I will show in the following chapters, selected nutritional supplements affect the cancer cell at multiple steps in its metabolism in such a way as to significantly interfere with its ability to survive. They do this without interfering with the effectiveness of chemotherapy or radiation therapy. By using different ways to kill and suppress cancer cells, nutrition, in fact, enhances the effectiveness of the conventional treatments.
To kill cancer cells, or to at least force them into a dormant state, every mechanism on which the cancer cell depends must be interfered with. Nutritional supplements do this more effectively than either chemotherapy or radiation treatments, and with little or no effect on normal cells, except to make them stronger.

Changing your diet is a very difficult thing to do, especially if the changes are drastic. Most of us are so accustomed to eating foods that are full of artificial flavors, very sweet, or creamy in texture that eating foods without these qualities becomes a chore. Dietary compliance is the most difficult problem I face in treating cancer patients. This is especially so for the patients having the worst diets. For example, a person who lives for his barbecued ribs, french fries, and soft drinks will have great difficulty switching to a plate full of fresh raw vegetables, fruits, and pure water.

If understanding why nutrition is so important does nothing else, it at least helps cancer patients to stick to the new diet. The more you understand the mechanisms by which phytochemicals inhibit cancer growth and spread, the more you will appreciate why even minor variations in your diet can have significant effects on your cancer. There is serious question as to whether cancers are ever completely eradicated. If they are not, then sticking to the diet becomes even more important, since the dormant cancer can be reactivated by a bad diet.

The longer you adhere to the diet, the easier it will be for you to follow. Tastes change with time. People on low-salt diets find normally salted foods far too salty. The same is true for low sugar diets: people on low-sugar diets soon find foods and drinks containing sugar to taste too sweet. This readjustment process of the taste buds allows us to conform to a diet we previously thought would be unbearable. It's all what we get used to.

Dietary Change In Cancer Patients

DIETARY CHANGES ON FIGHTING CANCER

Alcohol and cancer

Alcohol consumption significantly increases the risk of cancers of the mouth (oral/oropharyngeal cancer), throat (esophageal cancer), and voice box (laryngeal cancer), particularly in conjunction with cigarette smoking. Most studies documenting these associations also report that former drinkers have significantly lower risks for these cancers compared with current drinkers. Strong correlations between alcohol consumption and the risk of having liver cancer have also been reported.

Little is known about the effect of alcohol intake on the risk of female cancers other than breast cancer. Of the few published studies, findings have been inconsistent.

Fiber

Whole grains (such as rye, brown rice, and whole wheat) contain high amounts of insoluble fiber— the type of fiber some scientists believe may help protect against a variety of cancers. In an analysis of the data from many studies, people who eat relatively high amounts of whole grains were reported to have low risks of lymphomas and cancers of the pancreas, stomach, colon, rectum, breast, uterus, mouth, throat, liver, and thyroid. Most research focusing on the relationship between cancer and fiber has focused on breast and colon cancers.

Consuming a diet high in insoluble fiber is best achieved by switching from white rice to brown rice and from bakery goods made with white flour or mixed flours to 100% whole wheat bread, whole rye crackers, and whole grain pancake mixes. Refined white flour is generally listed on food packaging labels as “flour,” “enriched flour,” “unbleached flour,” “durum wheat,” “semolina,” or “white flour.” Breads containing only whole wheat are often labeled “100% whole wheat.”

Vegetarianism

The following two possibilities are both strongly supported by research findings:
• Some foods consumed by vegetarians may protect against cancer.
• Eating meat may increase the risk of cancer.

Compared with meat eaters, most, but not all, studies have found that vegetarians are less likely to be diagnosed with cancer. Vegetarians have also been shown to have stronger immune function, possibly explaining why vegetarians may be partially protected against cancer. Female vegetarians have been reported to have lower estrogen levels compared with meateating women, possibly explaining a lower incidence of uterine and breast cancers. A reduced risk for various cancers is only partly, not totally, explained by differences in body weight, smoking habits, and other lifestyle issues.

Fruits and vegetables

Consumption of fruits and vegetables is widely accepted as lowering the risk of most common cancers. Many doctors recommend that people wishing to reduce their risk of cancer eat several pieces of fruit and several portions of vegetables every day. Optimal intakes remain unknown.

Most doctors also recommend that people should not consider supplements as substitutes for the real thing. Some of the anticancer substances found in produce have probably not yet been discovered, while others are not yet available in supplement form. More important, some research, particularly regarding synthetic beta-carotene, does not support the idea that taking supplements has the same protective value against cancer as does consumption of fruits and vegetables.

Flavonoids

Flavonoids are found in virtually all herbs and plant foods. Consumption of flavonoid-rich onions and apples contain large amounts of one flavonoid called quercetin. Consumption of flavonoids in general, or quercetin-containing foods in particular, has been associated with protection against cancer in some, but not all, preliminary studies. Tomatoes Tomatoes contain lycopene —an antioxidant similar in structure to beta-carotene. Most lycopene in our diet comes from tomatoes, though traces of lycopene exist in other foods. Lycopene inhibits the proliferation of cancer cells in test tube research. A review of published research found that higher intake of tomatoes or higher blood levels of lycopene correlated with protection from cancer in 57 of 72 studies. Findings in of these 35 studies were statistically significant. Evidence of a protective effect for tomato consumption was strongest for cancers of the prostate, lung, and stomach, but some evidence of a protective effect also appeared for cancers of the pancreas, colon, rectum, esophagus (throat), mouth, breast, and cervix.

Cruciferous vegetables
Cabbage, Brussels sprouts, broccoli, and cauliflower belong to the Brassica family of vegetables, also known as “cruciferous” vegetables. In test tube and animal studies, these foods have been associated with anticancer activity, possibly due to several substances found in these foods, such as indole-3-carbinol, glucaric acid (calcium D-glucarate), and sulforaphane. In a preliminary human study, people who ate cruciferous vegetables were reported to have a lower-than-average risk for bladder cancer.


Fish

Fish eaters have been reported to have low risks of cancers of the mouth, throat, stomach, colon, rectum, pancreas, lung, breast, and prostate. The omega-3 fatty acids found in fish are thought by some researchers to be the components of fish responsible for protection against cancer.

Coffee

Years ago, researchers reported the greater the consumption of coffee in a country, the higher the risk of pancreatic cancer in that country. An analysis of data from studies published between 1981 and 1993 did find some association between high consumption of coffee and an increased risk of pancreatic cancer. Surprisingly, however, the same report found that people drinking only one or two cups of coffee per day had, on average, a lower risk of pancreatic cancer compared with people who never drink coffee.

Most, but not all, published reports have shown coffee drinkers are at increased risk of bladder cancer, though in one case the relationship was found only in men. In another study, the association was found only with caffeinated coffee. A review of trials found a small (7%) increased risk of bladder cancer in coffee drinkers compared with people not drinking coffee— a difference not statistically significant.

Calories

Scientists have known for many years that severe restriction of calories dramatically reduces the risk of cancer in laboratory animals. Scientists speculate that caloric content of the human diet may also affect cancer rates, though much less is known about the effect, if any, of moderate caloric restrictions in humans. In one report, adults with cancer were more likely to have consumed more calories during childhood compared with healthy adults. In other reports, attempts to find associations between reduced intake of calories and cancer have produced mixed results.

Only severe restriction in caloric intake provides significant protection in animal studies. As most people are unlikely to severely restrict calories, the association between caloric restriction and protection from cancer may ultimately prove to only be of academic interest.

Dietary fat

In studying data from country to country, incidence of ovarian cancer correlates with dietary fat intake. According to preliminary research, consumption of saturated fat, dietary cholesterol (as found in eggs), and animal fat in general correlates with the risk of ovarian cancer. Preliminary studies suggest dietary fat may correlate with the risk of uterine cancer. Some of the excess risk appears to result from increased body weight that results from a high-fat diet. Many years ago, researchers reported that animals on a high-fat diet formed skin cancers more rapidly than did other animals. Although some preliminary human research has found no relationship between dietary fat intake and the risk of skin cancer, 58 patients with basal cell and squamous cell skin cancers who were put on a low-fat diet for two years were reported to show a significant decrease in the number of new skin cancers compared with patients who maintained a high-fat diet. Similarly, precancerous lesions of the skin have been prevented in people put on a low-fat diet.

Polyunsaturated fats A chain of carbon atoms in which several are not attached to the maximum possible amount of hydrogen is called “polyunsaturated”––in other words, unsaturated with hydrogen in several places. When nutrition researchers talk about polyunsaturated fatty acids, they are often referring primarily to linoleic acid— a fatty acid found in nuts and seeds and most vegetable oils.

In animal research, the consumption of polyunsaturated fatty acids increases the risk of some cancers. However, in humans, most, though not all, reports do not find an association between polyunsaturates and cancer risks.

Sugar

A preliminary study has reported an association between an increasing intake of sugar or sugar-containing foods and an increased risk of gallbladder cancer. Whether this association exists because sugar directly promotes cancer or because sugar consumption is only a marker for some other dietary or lifestyle factor remains unknown.

Salt

In preliminary research, increasing intake of salt correlates with increased risk of stomach cancer. Associations between foods preserved with salt and the risk of cancers of the head and neck have also been reported. Animal studies suggest that the antioxidant or immune-enhancing effect of whey protein may produce anti-cancer effects. Preliminary human case reports suggest that 30 grams per day of whey protein may improve responses to anti-cancer medications, but more research is needed.

NUTRITION IN CANCER PREVENTION AND TREATMENT

NUTRITION IN CANCER PREVENTION AND TREATMENT

The ability of nutrition to prevent the occurrence of cancer is now beyond dispute. In a paper appearing in the journal of the American Dietetic Association, Dr. K. A. Steinmetz and his coworkers found by reviewing 206 of the best human cancer surveys and 22 animal studies that of all the dietary factors considered in relation to reducing cancer development, at all of its stages, the most important was the intake of fruits and vegetables.

In fact, over all, the cancer rates were reduced 50 percent in the people who ate the most fruits and vegetables, with the greatest reduction being in cancers of the esophagus, oral cavity, larynx, pancreas, stomach, colon, rectum, bladder, cervix, ovary, endometrium, and breast. Even better protection was seen with some types of cancer.

The greatest fall in cancer rates in humans has been with cancer of the stomach, attributed almost solely to a higher intake of vitamin C-containing foods. To better appreciate the power of phytochemicals in foods in preventing cancer, let us look at a study done in Japan. It was found that people eating the most yellow-green vegetables had a stomach cancer incidence 65 percent lower than those eating significantly fewer of these vegetables. If that is not impressive enough, another study found that persons eating citrus fruits just twice a month or less had a sixteen-times higher risk of developing stomach cancer than those eating fruits at least once a week or more.
Today we hear a lot about cancer of the pancreas. It took the lives of President Jimmy Carter's sister and actor Michael Landon, as well as of 28,200 people in the year 2000 alone. It has a mortality rate of more than 90 percent. Yet, its occurrence appears to be strongly related to our diet. In one study, it was found that people who ate no vegetables had a fourfold higher risk of developing pancreatic cancer than those who ate five or more servings of vegetables. Reducing the pancreatic cancer risk depended mostly on eating vegetables and fruits high in beta carotene and especially lycopene, the red pigment in tomatoes, pink grapefruit, and watermelon.2
This same red pigment appears to play a leading role in pre venting prostate cancer, with the risk being lowered 35 to 45 percent in those eating a lot of such fruits and vegetables.3 Vitamin E, especially when combined with selenium, also dramatically reduces the risk of this cancer.

While we are learning more about how these nutrients inhibit cancer, something even more exciting is occurring in the world of science. We are now finding that the very same nutrients can be used to inhibit the growth, invasion, and metastasis of cancers that already exist, and that when we combine these nutrients with conventional cancer treatments, such as radiation therapy or chemotherapy, the conventional therapies work significantly better. If that were not enough, an increasing number of studies have demonstrated that vitamins, minerals, and other phytonutrients can protect patients from the harmful side effects of these conventional treatments.

Numerous anticancer components are found in foods. A partial list includes:
● Allicin
● Antiestrogens and antiprogestins
● Carotenoids, folate, niacinamide, and vitamins A, D, K, and B12
● Coenzyme Q1o
● Ellagic acid
● Fiber
● Flavonoids (some .5,000 have now been identified)
● Glucosinolates
● Glutathione
● Glycolipids and glycoproteins
● Immune-enhancing polysaccharides
● Indole-3-carbinol
● Isothiocyanates
● Magnesium
● Phytates
● Protease inhibitors
● Saponins
● Selenium (principally in an organic form)
● Sterols and sterolins (plant steroids)
● Sulphoraphanes
● Zinc

Most patients dread the effects of chemotherapy and radiation treatments as much as, and sometimes more than, their cancer. This is especially so for patients who already have had to go through several rounds of chemotherapy treatments. Today, it is not uncommon for cancer patients to undergo such treatments for as long as a year. Overwhelming fatigue, nausea and/or
vomiting, diarrhea, loss of appetite, and severe bone marrow depression can make life seem hopeless and, for many, hardly worth living.
To be physically ill every day for months is very difficult. Yet my experience, confirmed now by many studies, has shown that patients do not have to suffer to receive benefit from the conventional treatments. The vast majority of the complications and side effects of the conventional treatments can be avoided by using simple nutritional methods.

While I do recommend many special supplements, the central and most important part of the treatment program is diet. As you shall see throughout this book, diet can mean the difference between success and failure. Many of the phytonutrients I will discuss are not available as separate nutrients, but are obtained by eating selected fruits and vegetables. By combining the two-special supplements and diet-you can supply your body with a very powerful brew of cancer-fighting nutrients.

I always tell my patients that if they try to depend on supplements alone and not change their diet, they will ultimately fail. It is estimated that as many as 70 percent of all cancers are related to the diet. To continue eating the same foods that led to your cancer in the first place is to travel down the road to disaster because, as you shall see, foods often contain extremely powerful cancer-causing and -promoting substances as well. The typical Western diet-high in red meats, bad fats, food additives, and carbohydrates-is a perfect cancer brew. Below we can see the effects that different dietary excesses can have on prostate cancer:
● High red-meat intake-200 percent increased risk
● High caloric intake-190 percent increased risk
● High dessert intake-180 percent increased risk

This brew not only causes cancer, but can promote the growth of existing cancers as well. This is especially true of fats. Certain fats, called omega-6 fatty acids, not only stimulate cancer growth, but also powerfully suppress the immune system at the same time. I tell my patients that eating these fats is like adding fertilizer to crab grass. Throughout the book I will describe other cancer fertilizers.

Another problem I see when discussing diet changes with my patients is what most people consider eating lots of fruits and vegetables to be. To many, it means eating their favorite vegetable or fruit. If they like green beans and bananas and eat them several times a day, they consider this to be eating a lot of fruits and vegetables. The beans often come from a can and have very little nutrition left plus have high levels of toxic metals. And the bananas, while having some important nutrients, are very high in sugar, a cancer growth-promoting nutrient. We see that regular consumption of these foods and a high total caloric intake dramatically increases men's risk of prostate cancer. Additional risk factors include milk consumption and a low intake of the omega-3 oils combined with a high intake of the omega-6 oils.

When I analyze most of my patients' diets, I find that the majority do not eat even two servings of fruits and vegetables a day. Most studies confirm this observation. For example, one survey found that Americans eat five or more servings of fruits and vegetables less than 25 percent of the time. The statistics are even worse for children.

In terms of health benefits (mainly in terms of antioxidants), eating fewer than five servings of fruits and vegetables a day does very little good. The health benefits begin at five servings, and for people below the age of fifty, they reach a maximum at ten servings. For those over the age of fifty, adding two additional servings-that is, consuming a total of twelve servings a day-provides the maximum health benefits. So, up to a limit, we gain greater benefit by eating more fruits and vegetables. Several studies have shown that eating large amounts of fruits and vegetables, especially vegetables, not only retards the growth of cancers, but can convert very aggressive cancers into much more benign tumors. This is a remarkable finding. In the past, we thought that once a cancer formed, its prognosis was always in one direction: Aggressive cancers stayed aggressive and less aggressive cancers could become more aggressive, but never the reverse. Newer studies are even showing, at least experimentally, that some cancer cells can be changed into normal cells using specific nutrients. So, instead of directing all our efforts into figuring out how to kill cancer cells without harming normal cells, we can simply change cancer cells back to normal cells.