Evidence Builds to Support Solar UVB Light and Vitamin D for Decreasing Breast Cancer Risk
A study by a team at the Sunlight, Nutrition and Health Research Center and that was recently published in the Anticancer Research journal has now added another layer to the growing pile of research that indicates that adequate vitamin D and skin exposure to solar UVB can help to reduce the risk of breast cancer as well as a number of other types of cancers.
The research showed that there was a direct link between vitamin D levels and solar ultraviolet B (UVB) irradiance and reduced rates of cancer mortality. This study was similar to one that had previously been conducted by the researchers (in 2002) but took into consideration a range of additional potential risk factors in order to rule them out.
What it determined was that people who reside in regions of low- and mid-latitude have a lower instance of breast cancer and a lower mortality rate among those who do have the disease than people who live in less sunny, higher latitude locations. More specifically, when looking at the United States, people who live in New Mexico, Utah and Arizona have a lower risk of breast cancer and a lower mortality rate among those who develop the disease than those who live farther north in the New England states.
The conclusion of the study was that greater exposure to UVB from the sun and the heightened vitamin D production is inversely connected with mortality rates from cancer, even when taking other risk factors into consideration.
- (i) The association of solar ultraviolet B (UVB) with reducing risk of cancer: multifactorial ecologic analysis of geographic variation in age-adjusted cancer mortality rates. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/16886679
Please visit this article to learn more about Vitamin D deficiency and what you can do about it.
Vitamin D Stops Breast Cancer Cell Growth
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Refer to Dr. Welsh’s recent publication, Vitamin D and cancer: integration of cellular biology, molecular mechanisms and animal models (http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/22536770) for more information on her topic.
For much more authorative information on Vitamin D for breast cancer treatment and prevention, visit the Vitamin D Council’s website here:
http://www.vitamindcouncil.org/health-conditions/cancer/breast-cancer/
The top of that page has general information on breast cancer. Keep scrolling down for the meat of the info specifically related to vitamin d and the breast cancer research.
Sufficient Vitamin D Levels Boosts Likelihood of Breast Cancer Survival
A study published in the Anticancer Research journal has revealed that breast cancer patients who have high vitamin D levels in their bloodstreams have a likelihood of survival that is twice that of women whose levels are low. The report was written by researchers from the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine.
Lead author of the study(i), Department of Family and Preventive Medicine professor, Cedric F. Garland, Dr.Ph, had shown in previous research that there was a higher risk of premenopausal breast cancer when low vitamin D levels were present. This pushed the researcher to discover a link between a metabolite the body produces when it uses vitamin D, 25-hydroxyvitamin D – and the survival rates for breast cancer patients.
Garland and the research team conducted a statistical analysis of five studies that recorded 25-hydroxyvitamin D levels at the time of a breast cancer diagnosis and that tracked the patients with follow-up research over the span of the nine years that followed. This involved the data from a combined 4,443 breast cancer patients.
What was determined was that the vitamin D metabolite switches on a protein vital to cell communication and that functions to stop aggressive cellular division. Therefore, provided that vitamin D levels are maintained at an adequate level, the prevention of tumor growth occurs and the cancer’s spread to the bloodstream is inhibited. It isn’t until the later stages of a tumor that vitamin D receptors are shut down, which also helps to explain why there is a higher survival rate among breast cancer patients who have higher blood levels of vitamin D.
According to the study’s co-author, Department of Medicine Associate Professor Heather Hofflich, DO, UC San Diego, this research provides a foundation upon which vitamin D treatments to be developed to be used as an adjuvant to current typical breast cancer therapies. Further study is required before such treatments could be developed.
- (i) Meta-analysis of Vitamin D Sufficiency for Improving Survival of Patients with Breast Cancer. http://ar.iiarjournals.org/content/34/3/1163.abstract
Vitamin D and Breast Cancer Link Identified
A study was published in a recent edition of the Breast Cancer Research and Treatment journal, which determined that a deficiency in vitamin D was connected with a heightened risk of breast cancer.
In the publication, the researchers suggested that vitamin D’s importance to cell growth regulation may be the link between its deficiency and the risk of cancer. The reason is that cancer occurs when abnormal cells experience uncontrolled division in a portion of the body.
This research(i) has only added to a growing body of evidence that suggests that vitamin D can play an important positive role in cancer. That said, additional study is required in order to clearly understand the relationship between vitamin D and breast cancer. This recent research represents the first time the concept was examined among Asian women.
This large study involved the participation of Korean women. The vitamin D levels were compared between a control group of 17,133 people and a group of 3,634 patients with breast cancer. The outcome of the analysis was that there was a 27 percent higher chance of breast cancer among people whose vitamin D levels were deficient when compared with those who had an adequate level of vitamin D. Menopausal status did not lead to a significant change in this risk increase.
- (i) Serum 25-hydroxyvitamin D deficiency and increased risk of breast cancer among Korean women: a case-control study.
Breast Cancer Patients More Likely to Survive when Vitamin D Levels are High
A study published in the Asian Pacific Journal of Cancer Prevention by researchers at the Catholic University of Korea has added its support to a growing body of evidence that suggests that women whose vitamin D levels are adequate have a greater chance of survival following a diagnosis of breast cancer.
What they determined was that women who maintained a level of 20 ng/ml or higher of 25(OH)D experienced a considerable improvement to their rate of survival when they had breast cancer. This research represented the first time vitamin D levels were measured steadily over time and that used alterations of the status of that nutrient as a breast cancer prognostic predictor. It also provided confirmation between the levels of vitamin D in the bloodstream of a patient and the likelihood of survival, studied in detail by using stratifications of age and cancer stage.
The researchers conducted a retrospective review(i) of 491 breast cancer patient medical records at St Vincent hospital in Korea. The data reviewed was from January 2000 through December 2008. The patients whose medical record data was analyzed had received baseline vitamin D level tests before having undergone surgery, as well as during their annual follow-ups over a period of four years. The survival results among stage 3 patients with higher vitamin D levels were particularly remarkable.
The researchers also took note of considerable vitamin D level fluctuations throughout the 4 year follow-up period and conducted an analysis on associations with survival rate.
The conclusion of the authors were that the vitamin D levels upon diagnosis of breast cancer and at the 1 year follow-up date is significantly linked with a breast cancer patient’s chances of survival. They stated that the findings of this study could show that an effort to maintain an adequate vitamin D level among patients through the use of supplementation or lifestyle modification may be considered to be worthwhile for improving survival from breast cancer.
- (i) Association Between Alterations in the Serum 25-Hydroxyvitamin D Status During Follow-Up and Breast Cancer Patient Prognosis. http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/25824788
Please visit this article to learn more about Vitamin D deficiency and what you can do about it.
