Privacy Policy. Avoiding cigarettes, limiting alcohol, reaching a healthy weight, and getting regular exercise are all great steps for preventing cancer. Adopting a healthy diet can also play a vital role. While research tends to point to associations between specific foods and cancer, rather than solid cause-and-effect relationships, there are certain dietary habits that can have a major influence on your risk. For example, eating a traditional Mediterranean diet rich in fruit, vegetables, and healthy fats like olive oil can lower your risk for a variety of common cancers, including breast cancer.
Conversely, a diet that includes a daily serving of processed meat increases your risk of colorectal cancer. If you have a history of cancer in your family, making small changes to your diet and behaviors now can make a big difference to your long-term health. To lower your risk for many types of cancer—as well as other serious disease—aim to build your diet around a variety of antioxidant-rich fruit and vegetables, nuts, beans, whole grains, and healthy fats.
At the same time, try to limit the amount of processed and fried foods, unhealthy fats, sugars and refined carbs you consume. Plant-based foods are rich in nutrients known as antioxidants that boost your immune system and help protect against cancer cells.
Currently, most of us fall well short of the recommended daily minimum of five servings of fruit and vegetables. For example, eat an unpeeled apple instead of drinking apple juice. Breakfast: Add fresh fruit, seeds, and nuts to your whole grain, low-sugar breakfast cereal such as oatmeal. Lunch: Eat a salad filled with your favorite beans and peas or other combo of veggies.
Add lettuce, tomato, and avocado to a whole grain sandwich. Have a side of carrots, sauerkraut, or fruit. Snacks: Grab an apple or banana on your way out the door. Dip carrots, celery, cucumbers, jicama, and peppers in hummus. Keep trail mix made with nuts and dried fruit on hand. Dinner: Add fresh or frozen veggies to your favorite pasta sauce or rice dish.
Fiber, also called roughage or bulk, is found in fruit, vegetables, and whole grains and plays a key role in keeping your digestive system clean and healthy. It helps keep cancer-causing compounds moving through your digestive tract before they can create harm. Eating a diet high in fiber may help prevent colorectal cancer and other common digestive system cancers, including stomach, mouth, and pharynx.
Eating a diet high in fat increases your risk for many types of cancer. But healthy types of fat may actually protect against cancer. Avoid trans fat or partially hydrogenated oil found in packaged and fried foods such as cookies, crackers, cakes, muffins, pie crusts, pizza dough, French fries, fried chicken, and hard taco shells. Add more unsaturated fats from fish, olive oil, nuts, and avocados.
People with low folate levels have a higher risk of:. But clinical studies have not yet shown a relationship between taking extra folic acid and cancer prevention. Currently, there is no strong enough evidence that multivitamins reduce cancer risk.
But 1 study showed a potential benefit. People who took multivitamins for more than 10 years had reduced colon polyp formation. Some polyps can develop into colorectal cancer if not removed during colonoscopy cancer screening. By reducing polyps, the study suggests multivitamins might also lower colorectal cancer risk.
But this research can be difficult to interpret. Usually, the healthiest people get regular cancer screening. And those people also commonly take multivitamins. One study evaluated whether selenium prevents cancer. Supplements did not prevent people with skin cancer from getting a second one. But it did reduce new cases of:. Some studies link selenium to a higher risk of diabetes.
So use caution when considering supplements that contain selenium. Vitamin C. Some studies show diets with higher amounts of vitamin C can lower stomach cancer risk. But results have been inconsistent. Vitamin E. High-dose vitamin C and E supplements have been shown to raise the risk of a head and neck cancer recurrence. A recurrence is when the cancer comes back after treatment. This relationship is strongest for colorectal cancer.
Most studies suggest a link between red meat and a higher risk of colorectal cancer. But avoiding processed meats is even more important. This includes bacon, ham, lunch meats, meat jerky, hot dogs, salami, and other cured meat products. The study also found that people can eat up to 18 ounces grams of unprocessed red meat a week without raising cancer risk. Eating more calories than your body needs can cause weight gain. Many people eat too much food with added sugar and fat.
The following foods add extra calories that can contribute to obesity:. Did you know you can help to reduce your risk of certain cancers by following a healthful lifestyle? Research shows that many cancers are linked to lifestyle behaviors including unhealthy eating patterns and a lack of physical activity. Eating well can help you prevent and beat cancer in a variety of ways.
While there is no guaranteed way to prevent cancer, a healthy lifestyle can help reduce your risk of developing it and positively support treatment and recovery if you are diagnosed with it. Excess body weight is associated with an increased risk for several types of cancer. By maintaining a healthy body weight, or losing weight if you have a body mass index BMI in the overweight or obese range, you can help to reduce your risk. Limit your intake of foods with added sugars and solid fats that provide a lot of calories but few nutrients.
These foods include: sugar-sweetened beverages, highly processed snack foods and desserts. Beans also contain fiber , which may also help reduce your risk of cancer, according to the American Cancer Society. By subscribing you agree to the Terms of Use and Privacy Policy. Health Topics. Health Tools. Reviewed: January 5, Medically Reviewed. Consider these anti-cancer diet guidelines: Eat plenty of fruits and vegetables. Fruits and vegetables are full of vitamins and nutrients that are thought to reduce the risk of some types of cancer.
Eating more plant-based foods also gives you little room for foods high in sugar. Instead of filling up on processed or sugary foods, eat fruits and vegetables for snacks.
The Mediterranean diet offers foods that fight cancer , focusing mostly on plant-based foods, such as fruits and vegetables, whole grains, legumes, and nuts. People who follow the Mediterranean diet choose cancer-fighting foods like olive oil over butter and fish instead of red meat. Sip green tea throughout your day. Green tea is a powerful antioxidant and may be an important part of an anti-cancer diet.
Green tea, a cancer-fighting food, may be helpful in preventing liver, breast, pancreatic, lung, esophageal, and skin cancer. Researchers report that a nontoxic chemical found in green tea, epigallocatechin-3 gallate, acts against urokinase an enzyme crucial for cancer growth. One cup of green tea contains between and milligrams mg of this anti-tumor ingredient. Eat more tomatoes.
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