There are approximately 200,000 to 3 million cases of colon cancer in the US each year; could coffee be cure for this illness? According to Diane Stern, co-anchor of WBZ News, drinking coffee daily seems to reduce the risk of colon cancer. In fact, the Dana-Farber Institute in Boston conducted a study revealing that “those who drank four or more cups of regular (not decaf) coffee per day saw the most benefit.”
Could Coffee Really Be the Cure for Colon Cancer?
Dr. Charles Fuchs, the director of the Gastrointestinal Cancer Center at the Dana-Farber Institute, led the study which examined 950 people suffering from advanced colon cancer who also went through surgery and chemotherapy. Patients suffering from stage III colon cancer and drank four cups (460 milligrams) of coffee daily lowered their risk of recurrence by 42 percent. “Even people who regularly drank slightly less (two to three cups) per day appeared to reap some of the same benefits, just to a lesser degree,” said Alan Mozes, reporter for HealthDay.
The Results Of The Study
329 participants experienced the recurrence of colon cancer within five years of the trial and 288 patients died of the terminal illness. “The researchers found that drinking two cups of caffeinated coffee daily was associated with a reduced risk for cancer recurrence and colon cancer death. That protection was even greater for those consuming three or four cups of coffee daily,” reported Mozes. However, despite the positive results of the experiment, researchers believe telling their patients to drink coffee as treatment/cure for colon cancer would be a rash decision, especially since there is only a 35 percent chance of colon cancer recurrence after treatment.
Granted coffee still has negative health effects such as weight gain, skin wrinkles and Osteoporosis. It’s also important to note “that this study was only designed to find an association between coffee consumption and a lower risk of colon cancer recurrence or death from colon cancer. It wasn’t designed to prove a cause-and-effect relationship,” said Mozes. Past studies have shown that coffee also has protective components against other cancers; postmenopausal breast cancer, melanoma, liver cancer and advanced prostate cancer. Although doctors do not intend to prescribe coffee to cancer patients; coffee may be responsible for the decrease in cases of colon cancer in the U.S. we expect to see next year.
