Non dairy.....why I feel let down by Jane plant
So...it transpires that one of the chief proponents of anti- dairy diet has had a recurrence. As someone who is following this diet i can't help but feel let down. This is primarily because of the way that the news has been buried deep within a website (you'd have to be a bit of a sleuth to find the news), which I find less than fully transparent, and partly because a woman who supposedly saved her own life with careful dietary changes- and who encouraged others to do the same- could lapse her diet to such an extent that she gets a recurrence. Or, alternatively, is not entirely clear that diet and associated lifestyle changes alone are not enough to fight the beast (this is what she's been arguing).
I find the way the following article is framed......"now that I got a recurrence and am again in remission proves that my diet works" rather cynical. After all there are the book sales to worry about.
Bad on you Jane Plant for not being entirely honest, and for not being the role model - in dietary terms - which surely your position and profile would warrant.
http://www.cancersupportinternational.com/new-evidence.asp
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And she doesn't forget to remind people her book is available on Amazon. How cynical!
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Sadly, it is about money.
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Very disappointing...On the bright side, she WAS in remission for 20 years!!!
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I've always been of the opinion that if someone is asking you to pay for information that could extend your life, they're full of sh*t. Whom among us with late stage cancer cancer wouldn't be more than happy to share what's worked without getting a dime.
Edited to remove a disrespectful remark.
Don't blame you for feeling let down.0 -
Leggo...I think that's a bit harsh...people with cancer pay for chemo etc as well...and, supposedly, that's not full of doodoo
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Joellelee, sorry if that sounded harsh. I should have said it better. To be clear, I said "information", not treatments.
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Being in remission for 20 years is indeed very positive, and getting a recurrence is dreadful, so I don't wish her ill. However, I found the lack of honesty about the fact that she has recurred problematic. If you google, you can find nothing at all on the topic. I think she could have managed the message much better.
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I do agree Jane Plant could have been more honest and handled this better!
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My dad bought me her book in 2004. I thought it was very good and I think she is right about the dairy. How many people are NED for that long after mets! I don't know what the story is about the recurrence. Did she have one and then not tell anyone? I'm sure it was devastating and I don't think that negates the value of her book, because it was a long time until the recurrence. As for making money on a book, nothing wrong with that either. Everyone needs to make $.
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perhaps the reoccurance is a new cancer from all tose4 imaging trips to find out it hadn't
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Interesting: I never heard of Jane Plant or her books, but from other books and readings etc gave up dairy save for organic plain yogurt a few times a week...Now because of your post I want to read about these books and her. Always impressed with phd women in traditional male fields...especially back some time ago when even fewer women were in the phd programs!
I'm not sure how she was decietful, after all isn't she coming out about her breast cancer? Or did she have it for a long time without telling? If so, maybe she needed time to process things for herself. The thing about diets though is that of course they are not guaranteed cures. It doesn't make me doubt the validity of what she and others seems to espouse generally. People who exercise regularly get cancer, and get recurrences. That doesn't change the evidence that exercise does seem to lower recurrence risk, generally. Just like tons of people who eat healthy vegan diets for years develop cancer, and get recurrences. That doesn't change the evidence that people who follow such diets have lower cancer rates and recurrences. You're just expressing disappointment, right? The author of Anti Cancer had followed his regime, yet he was dying of cancer. It didn't make his book less valuable to me becuase he died ultimately. I choose (as others point out above with regard to Plant) to believe that his healthier lifestyle added quality and quantity to the time he had left.
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I haven't given up dairy though I have cut down a lot ..I use organic milk,yougart,cheese and eggs...
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My young oncologist when asked "What are time tested ways I can reduce my risk of recurrence?" replied: "no binge drinking, keep you weight down, and exercise." No word on dairy, I don't think she's convinced. Long before cancer, I subscribed to the idea that dairy was for animals, not humans, and that it was probably best to keep it to a minimum. I drank a lot of soy milk...sigh.
Other than that, my general take on anyone who claims to have cured their cancer or gotten into remission with a particular regimen is full of baloney. If the medical world doesn't understand the mechanisms of cancer, why would this person? Some doctors will even admit they don't know if chemo is truly effective in early stage patients. If someone's cancer went into remission or was "cured"--a term I never use--they got lucky. To attribute it to a particular diet or regimen is totally irresponsible, and a disservice to the throngs of friends I have who eat well, exercise, and still got cancer.
I think Jessica's points are good here!
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Actually, the research on dairy (and there has been a ton of it) does not support the contention that there is a connection to breast cancer. Well, that's not entirely true, since some research shows lower breast cancer rates and lower recurrence rates for those who consume dairy. The key is to not consume high fat dairy - the fat content can be a problem.
I've posted an extensive review of the research many times before and won't do it again but anyone interested can do a search on this board of my name and the word "dairy" and should be able to find it.
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I asked my former onc's charge nurse about changing my diet radically a couple of years ago and her rather cynical reply was "maybe if you'd changed it 30 years ago".
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Beesie, I remember reading your links and being very greatful for the work you had done on it.
I have also not been able to find anything definitive or convincing to suggest that cutting out all dairy is in any way helpful. It seems, as you say, that low-fat dairy may even be a good thing, and from a few things I have seen (can't remember where) especially fermented low-fat dairy, like yogurt, buttermilk and kefir.
Going vegan is very in vogue at the moment, but there as well, I really have not seen any studies to convince me that this is helpful. It is good to get lots of veggies, but it does not have to be to the total exclusion of fish, eggs and some low-fat dairy.
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Balanced recommendations advise organic dairy, grass fed meat if you eat meat and food as natural as possible, ie not processed, no tinned food but frozen s fine more vegetables than any other food group.....
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You know I know people who drink like a fish eat what Eva they feel, smoke, drugs and they don't get cancer...and the healthy people who do everything right and still get cancer...
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Actually, RAW organic dairy is the healthier kind...and raw organic goat dairy even better. Wish I could stand goat milk.
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Joelle, there is no evidence I have been able to find that supports that contention. There is no reason why pasteurization should be bad in any way. The idea that raw milk is better somehow comes from Weston Price. Price had some interesting ideas, but is not someone to follow, IMO.
We can get a lot of goat milk products here, as well as buffalo milk, and I do buy those whenever practical.
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pasteurization kills all of the beneficial nutrients in the milk...plus regular milk has a ton of hormones and other junk in it from conventional farmers....nothing beats 'alive' nutrient raw organic milk from a local farmer.
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Joelle, I really don't think that is true at all. Which are the nutrients that are killed?
This article and many others indicate that there is no nutritional difference between pasteurized and non-pasteurized milk.http://www.eatingwell.com/nutrition_health/nutrition_news_information/is_raw_milk_more_nutritious_than_pasteurized_milk
Pateurization is actually a fairly gentle processing. When I was a kid, milk was typically boiled to make sure it was safe to consume. Boiling heats it more and longer.
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Where can I find data that supports the idea that Jane Plant has had a recurrence?
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davemclane, the information that supports that Jane Plant has had a recurrence can be found if you click the link at the bottom of the very first post at the top of this thread.
"I can now tell you about the unwelcome return of my breast cancer without causing alarm and despondency. I can do this because once again the cancer is fully in remission as confirmed by my oncologist, Professor Charles Coombes of Charing Cross Hospital when I last saw him in early July.
Last December (2011) I was admitted to St Mary's, Paddington as an emergency because I could not breathe and felt as if I was drowning. I had had a horrid cough and breathlessness for weeks which had worsened progressively. The doctors at St Mary's removed about two and a half litres of fluid from my lungs and after scans and tests on the fluid as well as blood tests I was told that my ER+ cancer had returned in the lining of my right lung, at various small centres through both lungs and in a thickening below my collar bone above my old mastectomy scar."
The above was written by Jane Plant.
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Yes, the first paragraph says:
"I can now tell you about the unwelcome return of my breast cancer without causing alarm and despondency. I can do this because once again the cancer is fully in remission as confirmed by my oncologist, Professor Charles Coombes of Charing Cross Hospital when I last saw him in early July."
Thus the recurrence is only part of the story. While it did indeed recur, it once again is "fully in remission" so I don't understand the complaints considering the other option in 1993: death within 3 months.
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Reading the original post, it appears to me that the disappointment is in the lack of transparency--the fact that Ms Plant didn't mention that she'd had a recurrence until some time afterwards. As nearly as I can tell from what she writes, she said nothing about the recurrence for about eight months, from the diagnosis in Dec 2011 to "the end of July" 2012.
Her cancer recurred, and (to quote further from the linked article)
"I ... was persuaded to try low dose Letrozole, a drug which blocks oestrogen formation in the body. When I returned to see Professor Coombes three weeks later , having taken my medication and kept strictly to Plant Programme 1, the tumour beneath my collar bone had already shrunk from >80 cm2 when it was first measured to <26 cm2 and chest X Rays confirmed that the amount of fluid in my lungs had diminished greatly. By April 2012 the fluid in my lungs had disappeared completely and the lump beneath my collar bone was' hardly palpable'. By the end of July I was pronounced clear and told that my cancer was once again in remission. I am sure that it was the combination of Letrozole with my diet that saved me once again." (bold added)
At least in the linked article, the only evidence she presents that her diet had anything at all to do with her going into remission is her own feeling of certainty about the matter. A feeling of certainty is not proof. Quite possibly, the letrozole had as much or more to do with her good outcome as the specific diet she advocates. I'm glad for her that she didn't die in 1993, and that she is in remission again, but if the level of evidence presented in her books is similar to that in the linked article, it falls a long way short of proof. I've never read her books, but if she is putting forward a specific diet as a way to reduce cancer risk, and still more if she advocates it as a form of treatment once cancer has been diagnosed, IMO, she owes it to her readers to have more evidence in support of her assertions than merely her personal feeling of being sure that it works.
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Curveball, I had similar impressions from reading her site. If you take femara and eat 3 green apples every morning and then the tumor shrinks, it is not reasonable to conclude that green apples cure cancer. I do think diet is important and may well play some role in taming cancer, but it has to be kept in perspective.
Somewhere she has testimonials from happy customers. One of them went on and on about how Jane's special juicing regimen had saved her hair during chemo. Then at the end, she mentions that she ALSO wore the cold caps. The juices probably helped her in some ways, but to think you can keep your hair during chemo by drinking carrot juice is magical thinking.
It also appears that this Plant lady is on a crusade against the "evil" dairy industry. This is another thing that bugs me in these arguments. That bad dairy is bad doesn't mean that all dairy is bad.
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A friend of mine wanted me to try Jane Plant's program after I had finished chemo. I had to tell my friend that opposite of Jane Plant I could claim that my primary tumor and mets disappeared after I started eating tons of cottage cheese and ice cream while on chemo. I barely had dairy before then. Just was not in the habit. My mouth was so sore from chemo though that I had to look for high energy foods that could be swallowed easily.
I do want to add though that dairy is different depending on how it's made. I'm lucky to have access to dairy from grass-fed cows. (My tax dollars provide heavy subsidies for such a luxury.) Fat from pastured cows contains more conjugated linoleic acid. European studies show a link between a diet high in CLA and lower risk of breast cancer. A French study showed a staggering 74% lower risk in women with the highest CLA levels compared to the ones with the lowest. Perhaps Jane Plant's dairy source was low in CLA, high in growth hormones.
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Heidi, the ice cream cancer cure! There has to be serious money in that.
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seems like the gadflies have returned to hecktor this thread
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