flaxseed inhibits tumor growth
Doug Skrecky (oberon@vcn.bc.ca)
Thu, 25 Jun 1998 01:51:41 -0700 (PDT)
Authors
Yan L. Yee JA. Li D. McGuire MH. Thompson LU.
Institution
Department of Biomedical Sciences, Creighton University School of Medicine,
Omaha, NE 68178-0405, USA. linyan:creighton.edu
Title
Dietary flaxseed supplementation and experimental metastasis
of melanoma cells in mice.
Source
Cancer Letters. 124(2):181-6, 1998 Feb 27.
Abstract
The present study investigated the effect of dietary supplementation of
flaxseed, the richest source of lignans, on experimental
metastasis of B16BL6 murine melanoma cells in C57BL/6 mice. Mice were fed a
basal diet or the basal diet supplemented with 2.5, 5 or 10%
flaxseed for 2 weeks before and after the intravenous
injection of 0.75 x 10(5) melanoma cells. At necropsy, the number of tumors
that developed in the lungs was counted, the cross-sectional area of tumors
was measured and the volumes of tumors were calculated. The median number of
tumors in mice fed the 2.5, 5 and 10% flaxseed-supplemented
diets was 32, 54 and 63% lower than that of the controls, respectively. The
addition of flaxseed to the diet also caused a
dose-dependent decrease in the tumor cross-sectional area and the tumor
volume. These results provide the first experimental evidence that
flaxseed reduces metastasis and inhibits the growth of the
metastatic secondary tumors in animals. It is concluded that
flaxseed may be a useful nutritional adjuvant to prevent
metastasis in cancer patients.