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Comment by zblevins | Hacker News Reader

I have heard some people having luck by switching to a ketogenic diet. Here’s a paper I could find on PubMed about this. Sorry to hear about your friend.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC9504425/

Edit: I am not a doctor. My wife is a physician and I spoke to her before posting this.

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This. It is very dependent on the type of cancer. There is a lot of research on this. For a little context, I was a pediatric neurology professor for a while, and have been on a low carb diet for a decade. Much of the department did low carb, as did much of the oncology dept. Many kids with epilepsy are put on keto as well with great effect. I did a deep dive into low carb research before starting and keeping with the diet, and found a lot about using it for cancer therapy. I'm not sure what has changed in the last 10 years, but the above abstract looks promising. With a GBM, they probably don't have much to lose. *This is not medical advice, I'm not an MD (I was a BME doing epilepsy research), have them check with their Dr.

The keto diet was actually developed specifically to help people with epilepsy[0].

[0]: https://epilepsysociety.org.uk/about-epilepsy/treatment/keto...

I wish I had something better to add, but I can add an anecdotal +1 to this.

A relative went keto pretty hard after a bad diagnosis and they are still going strong. As far as I understand it, cancer cells can only function on glucose.

Some types of cancer cells

do you have a source for this? not arguing, just would like to read more

In my life a relative (by marriage) went keto after a bowel cancer diagnosis, and died at age 45

+1 on this. I did my thesis on Glioblastoma-related imaging stuff [1]. The state of the art at the time (~2016) was that, realistically, none of the current treatments were "great", unfortunately. In short, you have 1) surgery, 2) chemotherapy, 3) radiation. Those treatments did extend survival in studies, but the overall survival of Glioblastoma patients was (tragically) still very bad at 12-24 months, and none of those therapy options were a cure.

As a side note, I recommend the book "Being Mortal" from Atul Gawande. The TLDR here is that our healthcare systems tend to overtreat patients, especially those with cancer who actually have a rather bleak prognosis, because it's easier for a physician to simply order all treatments and tell the patient "all good here, good luck" instead of taking the time to sit down and have a (long) conversation about the bleak prognosis and which options are actually still worth it. By "worth it" I mean that there are trade-offs to each treatment option, and it takes some very careful weighing whether each one provides a net benefit for your friend's individual situation. E.g. surgery might extend survival by X months, but might also create, worst case, new disabilities. So now you're faced with the very difficult decision of whether to potentially live for a shorter time with less disabilities, or for a longer time with more. There's no perfect answer, but having this sort of discussion is a good step which many patients unfortunately never take. I think this is a failure in our healthcare systems and maybe in the education of physicians.

Now, if I personally had a Glioblastoma, on top of the standard of care (surgery probably makes sense etc.), I think the ketogenic diet would currently be my best shot. Yeah, sure.. it's mostly only case reports so essentially anecdotal evidence, but it does look promising.

Good luck for your friend!

[1] https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=tinu7tYAAAAJ&hl=en

Thanks a lot, I hadn't seen this. I'll read through.

While we're thinking about it, Vitamin D3 and K2-mk-7 are known to be helpful in that regard.

Not an expert or doctor disclaimer.

Sugar is the food cancer cells crave. Not a miracle cure but restricting sugars may help reduce the growth of the tumor.

I'm pretty sure that's an old myth that sugar preferentially feeds cancer cells and that you somehow starve them by reducing sugar intake. After all, the body maintains stable blood glucose levels regardless of how low your sugar intake is.

e.g. https://news.cancerresearchuk.org/2023/08/16/sugar-and-cance...

"Reducing sugar intake" is not the same thing as ketosis. I have no strong opinions on whether it would work or not, but that's an article addressing something different and more clearly a misunderstanding.

Even in ketosis your body keeps a stable amount of glucose in your body. The mechanism is different, but the end result isn't.

Your brain _only_ operates on glucose, you'll never run out unless something is seriously wrong with your body.

If diet could stop cancer, we'd be done by now. I guarantee every cancer will mutate to overcome any change in diet you can throw at it.

All cancer treatments are probabilistic. There are no cures, just interventions that increase survival rates. There are no honest sentences that begin with "every cancer".

There is no diet that will even intervene with cancer, unless the patient dies.

Cancer is the patient's own cell that has mutated to a point beyond apoptosis and adapted to be able to draw nutrients from cells around it. It started from just one cell. It has already evaded dietary fluctuations and adapted.

EDIT: the reason I'm a spaz about this is I feel too many people focus on diet as the focus of cancer. While it might be good for some prevention, it will not stop it, and I want people to focus on real treatments.

I don't understand unreasonable positions like this.

Nobody is saying that people should stop "real" treatments or that diet must be the primary or sole focus for treatment. But given that a change of diet (a) costs nothing, (b) has no downsides, (c) potentially may work it seems strange not to do it.

And yet it is a highly focused topic and cancer rates have not gone down.

Are keto diet/lifestyle changes/etc actually used by doctors for cancer treatment? Even if those were effective you can't expect cancer rates to go down until they get deployed massively

I'm with you on this: Anyone that rejects clinically studied treatments in favor of "alternative" treatments is an idiot.

That said, the keto diet is being studied clinically and preliminary research does seem to indicate that it has an effect. So it may be an "in addition to" treatment. That said, the news isn't entirely good:

https://www.cancer.columbia.edu/news/study-finds-keto-diet-c...

The bottom line is ask your oncologist. They're probably paying attention to these keto studies and they know more about your cancer than HN does.

I did. Diet is not going to cure cancer, but they want us to eat well to survive treatments.

Are you sure about this? There is data to back it up in The China Study https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_China_Study and mentioned in the Forks over Knives documentary. That's more about prevention, but it has a measurable impact on cancer rates, I don't see how that could be classified as no impact.

The book has been debated.

https://www.redpenreviews.org/reviews/the-china-study-the-mo...

If diet stopped cancer, then the patients who eat less would see noticeable effect. This has never happened, except for maybe Otto Warburg, but even that is disputable[1].

[1] https://physoc.onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1113/JP278810

I appreciate the reply, I'll read through the links.

Diet impacts survival rate, in conjunction with treatment. Please stop spreading misinformation.

https://pmc.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/articles/PMC8749320/

This paper you linked didn't solve anything. Please read it, and stop spreading misinformation:

>> However, patients may not tolerate such a CR diet for prolonged time. Therefore, as alternative, it has been proposed an intermittent fasting regimen, whose beneficial effects also appear promising though somehow controversial in preclinical settings. This will require further elucidation in controlled clinical trials.

Have you spoken to oncologists and cancer nutritionists? I have.

It seems there's some misunderstanding here. The paper doesn't claim to have solved the issue but highlights areas requiring further research, particularly controlled clinical trials to confirm the effects. Intermittent fasting is indeed a complex and debated topic, as preclinical findings often don't translate directly into clinical practice.

I appreciate that you've spoken to oncologists and cancer nutritionists—real-world expertise is invaluable in discussions like this. Could you share any insights or perspectives they provided? It could help clarify and enrich the conversation for everyone.https://pakrozee.pk/

I cited a paper which showed “promising pre-clinical results” in the section you cited.

You have “trust me bro!” to dispute that.

Please stop spreading misinformation.

You cannot stop cancer cells with diet alone. If you think otherwise, make your own clinical trial and publish results. I'm not spreading misinformation, instead, I'm challenging those who claim their diet can cure cancer. Copy-pasting internet links doesn't cure cancer either.

> Effect of fasting on cancer: A narrative review of scientific evidence

> Emerging evidence suggests that fasting could play a key role in cancer treatment by fostering conditions that limit cancer cells' adaptability, survival, and growth. Fasting could increase the effectiveness of cancer treatments and limit adverse events. Yet, we lack an integrated mechanistic model for how these two complicated systems interact, limiting our ability to understand, prevent, and treat cancer using fasting. Here, we review recent findings at the interface of oncology and fasting metabolism, with an emphasis on human clinical studies of intermittent fasting. We recommend combining prolonged periodic fasting with a standard conventional therapeutic approach to promote cancer-free survival, treatment efficacy and reduce side effects in cancer patients.

https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/35848874/

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