Breast Cancer Diet – The Estrogen Factor

This year, nearly 200,000 American women will be diagnosed with breast cancer.  Currently, the lifetime odds are one in seven.  But new research in nutritional medicine has demonstrated that changing your diet may reduce your risk by up to 80%. In addition, changing your diet can successfully eliminate your breast cancer symptoms as well.

The most common forms of breast cancer are fueled by the female hormone estrogen.

Therefore, the main objective of an effective breast cancer diet is Estrogens detoxification. You MUST DETOXIFY ESTROGEN to prevent and heal breast cancer.

For many breast cancers, excess estrogen production is the key stimulator to the disease. When in balance, estrogen is an essential and healthful hormone. It is necessary for strong bones, a healthy heart, youthful skin and a good memory. When out of balance and in excess, estrogen plays a major role in breast cancer production.

Many different chemicals have been identified as being weak environmental estrogens. These include several pesticides (including some forms of DDT), the food preservatives BHT and BHA, the industrial detergent by-products nonyl- and octaphenol, compounds used in plastics including bisphenol A and some phthalates, the food dye Red #3, and the solvent formaldehyde which was used in carpet manufacturing, and is still used in making plywood.

The vital role estrogens play in the body

Estrogens play an important role in bone formation and maintenance. They exert protective effects on the heart and influence behavior and mood.

The hormone estrogen works as a chemical messenger in the body. It is essential for normal sexual development and functioning of female organs important for childbearing like the ovaries and uterus. Estrogen also helps regulate a woman’s menstrual cycles. It is necessary for the normal development of the breast. It also helps maintain the heart and healthy bones.

Estrogens circulate around the body bound to other proteins called sex hormone binding globulins (SHBG). Only unbound estrogens can enter target-tissue cells and induce biological activity – some good, some bad. So, any changes in these proteins (SHBG’s) will alter estrogen metabolism.

The ultimate effect of estrogen depends on how it is metabolized. Metabolism takes place primarily in the liver through detoxification that includes hydroxylation, methylation, glucoronidation, sulfation, and ends with excretion in the urine and feces.

In premenopausal women, the ovaries produce the estrogen estradiol (E2), which converts into estrone (E1), both of which must eventually be broken down and excreted from the body. This breakdown occurs primarily in the liver, and the excreted metabolites flow out in the bile or urine. Estradiol and estrone undergo this breakdown through a process called hydroxylation, an enzymatic activity in which the parent estrogen is transformed by the addition of a hydroxyl (OH) group at specific positions on estrogen’s molecular ring

There are 3 different pathways which estrogen can be metabolized within the liver. Only one is a healthy choice. The other two cause cardiovascular issues and breast cancer. Unfortunately, there are many environmental and dietary reasons that push the detoxification down the wrong pathways. Many adult bodies do not detoxify properly – often because of dietary insufficiency and environmental overload of toxins and stresses. For some, the problem lies in the methylation, or failure to methylate properly, for others, glucoronidation and sulfation. If it’s not the healthy pathway, you are setting up your body for future cardiovascular disease or breast cancer.

What happens when estrogen goes down the wrong pathway?

• Estrogens are recycled rather than excreted. Without proper metabolism, excess estrogens are created. This can lead to cancer in hormone sensitive tissue, such as breast or prostate.
• Your body will produce high levels of quinones – which have potential carcinogenic effects.
• Your body will store estrogens in target tissues, primarily the breast and prostate – with the ultimate potential – development of breast and prostate cancer. FACT: women who send estrogen down the wrong pathway have significantly elevated risk of breast cancer.

The common-sense solution to healing and preventing breast cancer then, is reducing the estrogen levels in your body.

The conventional treatment for lowering estrogen levels is the drug Tamoxifin.

In April 1998, the National Cancer Institute reported that high-risk women who took the drug Tamoxifin decreased their risk of breast cancer by 45 percent. Tamoxifen diminishes the effect of estrogen, the chief fuel for breast cancer growth, by blocking the estrogen receptors.

Tamoxifen (Nolvadex) is a drug, taken orally as a tablet, which interferes with the activity of estrogen, a female hormone. Estrogen can promote the development of cancer in the breast. Tamoxifen is approved by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) for the prevention of breast cancer and for the treatment of breast cancer, as well as other types of cancer.

The natural common-sense solution is to eat Phytoestrogens

Phytoestrogens, sometimes called "dietary estrogens", are a diverse group of naturally occurring non steroidal plant compounds that, because of their structural similarity with estradiol (17-?-estradiol), have the ability to cause estrogenic or/and antiestrogenic effects.

Several types of plant lignans are phytoestrogens, meaning that they mimic the effects of estrogen.

Lignans found in fiber-rich foods such as seeds and grains, and in particularly high concentrations in flaxseeds, contain phytochemicals that, when acted upon by bacteria in the gut, are converted to the metabolites called enterolactone and enterodiol, which appear to have similar effects as isoflavones. Researchers have demonstrated in animal and cell studies that lignans have chemoprotective effects, and they may influence estrogen production and metabolism

Lignans reduce the amount of the carcinogenic estrogen metabolite (16a-hydroxyestrone), and increase the neutral-to-favorable estrogen (2-hydroxyestrone), thereby increasing the 2-OH:16 alpha-OH ratio.

Phytoestrogens are compounds that occur naturally in plants (phyto) and under certain circumstances can have actions like human estrogen. When eaten they bind to estrogen receptors and may act in a similar way to estrogen. However, phytoestrogens are much weaker, so their effects are different from those of hormones found in Hormone Therapy.

Phytoestrogens are plant estrogens found in foods like soybeans, tofu, whole grains, fruits and vegetables, and certain spices and herbs. The word "phyto" is from the Greek word for plant. A diet rich in phytoestrogens has been proposed as a way to decrease breast cancer risk. Some, but not all studies show that women with a diet high in phytoestrogens, including vegans (who eat no animal foods) and women who eat diets high in soy products, have lower rates of breast cancer.

Most phytoestrogens are not stored in the body but are quickly broken down. Phytoestrogens are weak estrogens, and may prevent stronger human estrogens from binding to the estrogen receptor. If the weaker estrogens bind to the receptor instead of the stronger ones, there may be less breast cell division. Women with diets rich in phytoestrogens also excrete more estrogens into their urine, and have lower blood estrogen levels.

The consumption of a phytoestrogen-rich diet has been linked to reduced rates of heart disease and breast cancer.

Some studies have shown that women with a diet rich in phytoestrogens have longer, and hence fewer, menstrual cycles. All of these factors may contribute to reduced breast cancer risk.

Click here to learn some practical breast cancer estrogen reduction tips.

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