Colon Cancer

Cancer of the colon and its neighboring area, known sometimes as colorectal cancer, affects both men and women. Like breast cancer and prostate cancer, colorectal cancer is seen much more frequently than skin cancers and is much more deadly. About 150,000 Americans are told each year that they have colon cancer, and about 35 percent of these will die of it. There are many contributing factors in why someone gets colon cancer, but the most commonly acknowledged one is diet. Diets high in fat and nonorganic non-grass-fed red meat are especially dangerous. Other diets, such as high in fruits, vegetables, and other natural raw and organic foods, help prevent colon cancer.

A study published in the Journal of Clinical Oncology in 2008, conducted by lead researchers Dr. Kimmie Ng of the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston found that high blood levels of vitamin D increased colon cancer patient’s survival rate by 48 percent. In this study, Dr. Ng and her team collected data on 304 patients who had been diagnosed with colon cancer between 1991 and 2002. Everyone in the study had their vitamin D blood levels measured a minimum of two years before being diagnosed with the disease. The patients were tracked until they died or until the study ended in 2005; 123 patients died, 96 of them from colon or rectal cancer during the follow-up period. Dr. Ng and her team found that the patients with the highest vitamin D levels were 39 percent less likely to die from colorectal cancer than the patients who had the lowest levels.

These findings are consistent with dozens and dozens of other observations that have been made in the past decade, including those by Dr. Cedric Garland. His lab reports that you are three times less likely to die from colon cancer if you have healthy levels of vitamin D in your bloodstream.