Cancer Survival Gets Strong Boost From Exercise, Diet

"When facing down a cancer diagnosis, patients often ask: What can I do to help my own odds?

 

The answer, data increasingly shows, is to go back to the basics: exercise and a good diet.

 

A structured exercise program with a trainer helped colorectal cancer patients lower their risks of death and cancer recurrence after treatment, according to a study released Sunday at the American Society of Clinical Oncology's annual conference in Chicago and published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

 

The study spanned more than a decade and is the first to answer conclusively in a controlled trial whether physical activity can improve cancer-related survival, the study's authors said. Patients in the program had a 37% lower risk of death after eight years, compared with patients who only received educational information on exercise.

 

"That is on par with the best treatments out there," said Peter Campbell, a cancer epidemiologist at Montefiore Einstein Comprehensive Cancer Center in New York, who wasn't involved in the trial. "If this were a therapeutic, people would leave the building to go order this drug for their patients on Monday morning."

 

A separate study released at the conference found that eating a diet heavier in foods that research shows can increase inflammation was linked to worse survival overall in colorectal cancer patients compared with those who consumed less-inflammatory foods. Other researchers are presenting data on how higher-fiber diets could improve melanoma patients' response to immune-boosting drugs.

 

Knowing that more movement and a healthy diet are good for a person's health seems obvious, but growing evidence is finding that they could also boost some cancer patients' lifespans or responses to therapy. Helping improve patients' quality of life has taken on increasing urgency in recent years, as patients are surviving longer with a range of cancers.

 

Testing healthy habits with the same rigor as researchers would test a drug might persuade health systems and insurers to help patients stick with lifestyle changes, according to doctors. "That's really challenging for someone to maintain on their own without a nutritionist and coaching," said Dr. Sara Char, an oncology fellow at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute in Boston who was part of the analysis on diet in colorectal cancer patients.

 

Chronic inflammation is a risk factor for colon cancer, spurring the new analysis to see if there were differences in outcomes based on patients' diets. It found that eating an inflammation-linked diet heavier in processed meats, refined grains and sugary beverages was linked to worse survival from any cause, compared with a diet higher in leafy greens and drinks including coffee or tea. There wasn't, however, a significant difference in rates of cancer relapse or deaths from cancer specifically, the researchers found.

 

In the exercise trial published Sunday, some 890 patients across six countries who had either stage-3 or high-risk stage-2 colorectal cancer were enrolled after getting surgery and chemotherapy. Half received educational materials that promoted physical activity and healthy nutrition. The others were set up with a certified exercise consultant, with the goal of adding 2 1/2 hours of some form of moderately intense exercise a week and sustaining that for three years.

 

Patients who underwent the structured program had a 28% lower risk of their cancer coming back or developing a new cancer, the trial found. At eight years, 90% of the patients in the exercise program were alive, compared with 83% of the other patients. The program prevented one death for every 14 people who joined it, the researchers said.

 

"We saw the data, and we didn't sleep for like three days," said Dr. Christopher Booth, the study's co-chair and an oncologist at Kingston Health Sciences Center and Queen's University in Ontario. "It was just so remarkable, the biological effect of exercise."

 

Another trial set to be presented in Chicago recruited 43 melanoma patients who were starting immunotherapy and shipped higher-fiber or lower-fiber meals to their homes for up to 10 weeks.

 

Some 77% of patients on the high-fiber diet responded to their immune-boosting treatment, compared with 29% in the control group.” [1]

 

1. U.S. News: Cancer Survival Gets Strong Boost From Exercise, Diet. Abbott, Brianna.  Wall Street Journal, Eastern edition; New York, N.Y.. 02 June 2025: A3.