I have read this theory in a couple of places over the years, implying that PC was different from all other cancers in that it does not feed on sugar, and that maybe fat was a bigger concern with PC, sugar intake not so much. And indeed, I have seen some studies that show a lower % diagnosed with PC among diabetics.
I have argued that this seems unlikely that PC would be the one cancer made better by diabetes and insulin resistance and high blood levels of insulin. And that more likely, this apparent anomaly was due to the fact that adult onset/type 2 diabetes mellitus(DM) is diagnosed these days at earlier ages, even among our children who eat more carbs than ever, along with less exercise. And therefore, it is not the diabetes and high blood sugars/insulin that is protective, but rather the early treatment for diabetes with diets and meds that lower both blood sugar and blood insulin. Something that tends to occur many years earlier on average than does the PC diagnoses. So this has been a theory of mine lately, along with that someday blood insulin levels would be shown to be a big factor in PC occurrence and mortality, as it is in all other cancers.
I think this study backs up my theory. It shows that even if you might be less likely to be diagnosed with PC as a type 2 diabetic, diabetics are more likely to die of PC than non-diabetics. Not only that, but those whose diabetes is controlled by diet alone are less likely to die of PC than those who can control it with oral agents alone. Not only that, those who are in any of the other groups( no DM, DM diet control only, DM oral agents only) are less likely to die than those who must control it with insulin. (which means they are having to inject even more insulin to go with their already high blood insulin levels, resulting in an even higher blood insulin level).
I found the charts and graphs hard to read for some reason, so I get most of this from the discussion. But the discussion does not cover specific cancers like PC, as the charts/graphs do. However, if you look at figure 1, "Estimated HRs of cancer mortality for male diabetic vs non-diabetic patients for each cancer site,"
you will see the hazard ratios listed for PC deaths, along with all the other cancers. And you will see that starting with 1.0 for "no diabetes", that the HR increases for each step along the way that goes with higher blood sugar/insulin: lowest no DM, then DM diet only, then DM with Metformin type drugs(oral), and solidly at the top, DM on insulin.
Brothers with diabetes, forgive me if I cause any bad feelings or anxiety by presenting these studies. I don't like being the bearer of bad news for any of you or myself. OTOH, the good news is: if you are type 2 DM, there is much you can do with diet to control or even cure this disease, and to reduce, stop or never start insulin in the 1st place. In fact, I am fasting today because I have knocked on the door of pre-diabetes a few times myself over the years. And this is why I always at least try to limit my net carb intake, despite my love for all carb type foods. However, I think this study shows that- regardless of diagnoses rates- that the high levels of blood sugar and most certainly insulin that goes with diabetes( and probably even pre-diabtetes IMO) is related to death from PC just as it is all other cancers(though much more so with some other cancers)
/link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00125-014-3186-z/fulltext.htmlSomebody said...
Aims/hypothesis
The prognostic role of different diabetes treatment types has not been studied in detail. We compared mortality rates among cancer patients with and without diabetes, accounting for diabetes treatment and diabetes duration.
Methods
This register-based study included all cancer patients diagnosed in Denmark during 1995–2009. The patients were classified into four groups according to diabetes status at the time of cancer diagnosis: no diabetes, diabetes without medication, diabetes with only oral hypoglycaemic agent (OHA) or diabetes with insulin treatment. Poisson models were used to examine the association between pre-existing diabetes in cancer patients and mortality relative to the non-diabetic cancer population.
Results
For cancer overall, as well as for most specific cancer sites, mortality was higher among cancer patients with diabetes relative to non-diabetic patients. In all three diabetic groups the HRs followed a similar pattern for the specific cancer sites. For all cancer sites, there was a general tendency of increasing HRs according to diabetes treatment, i.e. patients using OHAs and insulin experienced higher mortality rates.
Among 426,129 patients with incident cancer, we identified 42,205 patients with diabetes prior to cancer diagnosis. Overall, cancer patients with diabetes had higher mortality rates than non-diabetic cancer patients, highest among OHA- or insulin-treated patients. For all cancers combined and diabetes duration of 2 years at cancer diagnosis, insulin-treated patients experienced the highest mortality rate ratios starting from 3.7 (95% CI 2.7, 5.1) for men and 4.4 (3.1, 6.5) for women 1 year after cancer diagnosis, increasing to 5 (3.5, 7.0) for men and 6.5 (4.2, 9.3) for women 9 years after cancer diagnosis.................
Conclusions/interpretation
Our study provides strong evidence that cancer patients with pre-existing diabetes experience higher mortality than cancer patients without diabetes. The higher mortality seen among cancer patients treated with OHAs or insulin is in accordance with the existing evidence that more intensive diabetes treatment reflects a larger degree of comorbidity at the time of cancer diagnosis, and hence poorer survival.
I don't see any mention of specific cancers like PC in the discussion, you must look to the charts and tables to find that, like Figure 1. I think it behooves us all to keep a lid on our net carb consumption. Ha, I'm one to be talking! I try, but I am prone to failure. The HRs listed above can probably be compared to the risk of death - a least for some categories of PC- to no treatment, though I am just making a wild *** guess about
that, I might be way wrong. IOW, simply adopting a diet that drops your insulin and gets you into one of the lower categories, especially the no DM category, might increase your odds as much as(hopefully in addition to) some treatments. But of course that is just my opinion, I might be wrong.
Post Edited (BillyBob@388) : 1/26/2018 6:43:47 PM (GMT-7)