How Do I Avoid Pancreatic Cancer: Folic Acid and Pancreatic Cancer Prevention

The B-vitamin folic acid (the vitamin form of folate) seems to play an important role in preventing pancreatic cancer.

In the modern population as a whole, the risk of ever developing pancreatic cancer is less than 1 per cent, but certain groups are much more likely to develop this dreaded disease:

• People who have had long-standing cases of other conditions involving the pancreas, such as chronic pancreatitis or diabetes.
• People who have been exposed at work to DDT, gasoline, petroleum distillates at refineries, or solvents (specifically benzidine, 2-naphthylamine, or naphthalene).
• Blacks more than whites, certain Jewish families who carry a genetic mutation more than either.
• Heavy drinkers, and
• Heavy smokers.

The common nutritional link among all these groups is a disturbance in the body's supply of and ability to use folic acid, as well as serum folate stability, the ability of the body to keep this B-vitamin in circulation. Folic acid is essential to the process of methylation, a detoxification process in the liver that turns the chemicals in tobacco smoke, additives to alcoholic beverages, petrochemicals, and the like into harmless forms. If there is not enough folic acid in the diet, or if there is some genetic factor that causes the body to use folic acid inefficiently, pancreatic as well as breast and prostate cancers are more likely. The increased risk of pancreatic cancer among smokers, whose bodies use up folic acid at accelerated rates, was measured in one study as 48 per cent.

In North America and Australia, it's extremely easy to avoid folic acid deficiency due to folate intake from grains, but, nonetheless, some people eat folic acid-deficient diets. Almost every cereal and bakery product is fortified with this B-vitamin in levels that are more than enough to prevent deficiency. If you don't eat prepackaged cereals or baked goods, other excellent souces
of folic acid are:

• Rice,
• Peanut butter,
• Chicken,
• Leafy greens, especially lettuce, spinach, and turnip greens,
• Beans and peas, and
• Vegemite

although because of the peculiar way grains are processed in most of the world, you actually get up to 100 times more folic acid from highly processed foods and even from fast foods than from whole, organic, and otherwise healthier food choices.

You may also be interested in:

Vitamin D and the Risk of Pancreatic Cancer
Alternative Pancreatic Cancer Therapies
Pancreatic Cancer and L-Arginine Supplementation
Does a Red-Meat Diet Increase Risk of Pancreatic Cancer?