Breast Cancer Spread - Vit D

"Research from Canada suggests that women with breast cancer who were low in Vitamin D at the time of their diagnosis had a higher risk of the cancer spreading and poorer survival rates compared with women who had adequate levels of Vitamin D."

 

 

I hope I haven't offended you someway.

 

Keep spreading the D word!

 

Ronda

       When they mix up all of us BC's in these studies it sure gets confusing.  It sounds like most of the women in this study were deficient, and nothing was done to get there levels up the entire time, they just wanted to see what would happen in the long run and the outcome wasn't good.  I'd rather see a study where levels were increased and then we were studied.  Less than half of the women studied were given adjuvant treatment, who knows how many were tiple negs in that group.  It's really hard to see where we fell in all of this, with tumors that tend to be larger and lymph node spread more common perhaps no adjuvant treatment given especially in this setting where they knew about deficiencies AND DID NOTHING. Also it seems a bit obsolete watching gals in the late 80's from Canada where treatment isn't the best and given the strides made in treatment in the last few years.  

      I think the bigger question is what happens to your body when it is d deficient regardless of if you have cancer or not.  Healthy gene and cell expression can be affected, auto-immune, hormone, malabsorbsotion issues are all a part of this picture.  How can we possibly survive all of these cancer treatments if a fundamental component is lacking in us getting well? I think vitamin d deficiency is certainly linked in the prevention of certain cancers including ours, but once the horse is out of the barn, it can also play a key role in longer, healthier survival, and who knows what else.  There is not alot of money in studying vitamin d cuz it's soooo cheap, free really, but I think as more and more people become aware I believe you will see that it does make a difference even with triple negatives and I think it will play a key role in making BC chemotherapy more effective just like it has with colon cancer. 

     The bottom line is it makes a difference with just about everything for those who are deficient and suffering from poor health.  To me this is so basic that getting our levels up should be the first thing we do before we undertake all of the other stuff they throw at us for joint aches, depression, infection, IBS you name it, including chemo.  If we give our body what it needs to work right, sometimes it actually starts working right.  To me it's like a car that needs gas, you can give it a new engine and it won't run, you can give it a new battery and it won't run, you can give it a pep talk and it won't run....it's because it needs gas.  This is what vitamin d is to us.  

       I know I'm cyncial about the studies, but I feel it's like if someone said we need to study water before we can decide it's a benefit to cancer patients and whether or not it changes outcome, try going without out it and see what the outcome is.  We were designed to make this stuff in pretty large quantities,  I'm tanner now than I have been in years brimmming with free D!.  Big pharma knows there is no money in vitamin d because it can't be patented, my guess is it will have to be Susan G. who will have the final say.  In the meantime having your levels up doesn't hurt, and can really help us feel better and live longer while we are waiting for the cure.

 

The only definitive answer is "there are no definitive answers".

 

Here's to chaos!

 

Love Ronda

 

Want you to know that I had my yearly gyn appt. on Wednesday, and the first words out of her mouth was "I want you to take 1000 iu's of D per day." After I have my bloodwork, we will see if I need more. My hubby is also taking it. It was pretty cheap. He got  2 bottles (100 tabs) 1000 iu's per tab,  for $6.48? at Walmart. He bought 6 bottles. Lori takes almost 5000 iu's per day, and is out in the sun(when we have it) evrey chance she gets. No sunscreen!!! Never did use sunscreen.

 

Gyn said that D is the buzz "word" now. Well, once she gets on the site (gave her the tnbc foundation site) she will see that we knew about it loooong before she did Thanks to our VITAMIN GURU Ronda.

 

Hugs,

Nancy

 

Will do!! So how much will I need to take if my levels are not between 50 and 70?

Nancy

 

Beth Anne, Adequate vitamin D levels are important to everyone, but especially people with disease like cancer, so the boob thing doesn't matter.  It will also help your body rebuild itself during and after cancer treatment.  I haven't heard of any restrictions of it's use during chemo or rads.  I don't think it will help with hot flashes because it doesn't replace hormones.  I have heard that we Triple negs can get a bit of hormone replacement for hot flashes because we are ER-.  Ask your onc about it.

 

If you want to read up on vitamin d:

 

www.vitamindcouncil.org

 

Ronda

 

Ronda