A recent study has found that adherence to the Mediterranean diet after a cancer diagnosis is associated with a lower mortality rate, especially from cardiovascular disease.
The study was conducted by researchers from the Department of Epidemiology and Prevention at the Scientific Institute for Research, Hospitalization and Health Care Neuromed, and the Department of Medicine and Surgery at the Free University of the Mediterranean in Italy. Its results were published in the journal “JACC CardioOnco” on July 2, and were written about by the EurekAlert website.
Strong health ally
The Mediterranean diet is a powerful ally for health even after a cancer diagnosis. According to the study, people diagnosed with any type of tumor who adhered to the Mediterranean diet in the year before they enrolled in the study lived longer and had a lower risk of death from heart disease than those who adhered less to the diet.
The study examined 800 Italian adults, men and women, who were diagnosed with cancer at enrollment between 2005 and 2010. The participants were followed for more than 13 years, and detailed information about their food intake was available during the year before enrollment.
“The beneficial role of the Mediterranean diet in the primary prevention of some tumors is well known in previously published research, but little is known about the potential benefits that this dietary pattern can offer to those already diagnosed with cancer,” says Marialaura Bonaccio, study author and researcher in the Department of Epidemiology and Prevention at the Scientific Institute for Research, Hospitalization and Healthcare Neuromed.
Given that the number of cancer survivors is expected to increase in the coming years due to targeted and effective treatments, it is important to understand how a healthy diet affects survival. For this reason, Italian researchers examined the role of the Mediterranean diet in the relationship with mortality in people who had a history of cancer at the time of enrollment in the study.
“Our study results suggest that people who had cancer and reported high adherence to the Mediterranean diet had a 32% lower risk of death compared to participants who did not follow the Mediterranean diet, and the benefit was particularly pronounced in deaths from cardiovascular disease, which were reduced by 60%,” Bonaccio adds.
Common soil for diseases
“These data support an interesting hypothesis, namely that different chronic diseases such as tumors and heart diseases, in fact share the same molecular mechanisms. This is known in previous research as the common soil, that is, the common ground from which these two groups of disorders arise,” confirms Maria Benedetta Donati, researcher in the Department of Epidemiology and Prevention at the Scientific Institute for Research, Hospitalization and Health Care Neuromed.
“The Mediterranean diet consists mainly of foods such as fruits, vegetables and olive oil, which are natural sources of antioxidant compounds, which could explain the observed benefit in terms of mortality, not only that caused by cancer, but also by cardiovascular diseases, which can be reduced by diets particularly rich in these biologically active compounds,” explains Chiara Tonelli, president of the scientific committee of the Umberto Veronesi Foundation in Italy.