What is put into our bodies greatly affects our overall health. This is definitely true in the case of preventative medicine for the prostate. A healthy prostate diet can help to reduce the incidence of prostate cancer and other forms of prostate disease, including having an enlarged prostate.
A good prostate diet leads to a healthy prostate. A very important organ, the prostate rests below the bladder. It is an organ associated with reproduction and directly influences urine flow because the tube that carries the urine runs down the middle of the prostate. If the prostate is enlarged this will block the flow of urine, which is known as BPH. Experts say that the enlargement of this organ is normal over time and it appears that as men age, the prostate gets larger too. Men over age 55 could have an enlargement of about 4% and that percentage will increase, as you get older.
Does diet have an effect on your prostate?
The experts in the medical journals seem to think so. You might be thinking how is this possible when age appears to be a direct link to an enlarged prostate. Like many disorders, the food you take in can have a direct affect on how bad it gets. In fact, food could even prevent certain diseases. Certainly you would agree that a prostate diet full of foods that help instead of hinder is worth reading about.
In order to maintain optimum prostate health, eating a prostate diet rich in vegetables can lower your risk of problems by 40%. Studies have proven that vegetables fight cancerous cells in the body. Eating plants from the cabbage family are especially important, as they contain fiber and live enzymes that aid the digestive process. A prostate diet would not be complete without at least five daily servings of veggies. This includes eating broccoli, kale, Brussels sprouts and cabbage. The veggies helps with getting plenty of vitamin C among other excellent nutrients, and vitamin c seems to be associated with lowering your risk as well. Vitamin C from bell peppers, snow peas, cauliflower and tomatoes should also be part of a prostate diet. Lycopene, which is an antioxidant that has been proven to fight cancer, can be found in tomatoes, and should be included at least two times per week. While ones vegetable intake should be increased, fruit should not. Lowering fruit consumption may be the opposite of what one would expect, however it should be cut back to one daily serving. This will reduce the possibility of yeast overgrowth, which can be a problem with those suffering with prostatitis. The single serving also includes drinking fruit juices.
Remove caffeine from your diet and increase water consumption. While this may deter a lot of people, avoiding sodas and caffeinated teas and coffee can be quite beneficial. Caffeine is bad for a healthy prostate and the body overall, and the phosphoric acid found in these products weakens the bones. Diet drinks are loaded with unhealthy chemicals as well. Instead, try drinking herbal decaffeinated teas, and drink six to eight glasses of water each day. Green tea is good for the prostate as it contains an ingredient called polyphenol, researchers conclude that plant derived polyphenols can slow the growth of cancer cells and also stop a domino effect of reactions linked to self-destruction of cells. This should be a main component of your prostate diet, especially as your age increases.
Other things to have as part of a prostate diet include eating meat (lots of debate on eating meat) and increasing zinc and omega 3. Meat has zinc. The highest levels are found in lamb, duck and lean beef. Baked beans are also a good source of zinc as well as oysters and crab. When addressing a prostate diet, the importance of regular exercise cannot be overlooked. Studies have shown that the men at the lowest risk for BPH are those men who are not obese and have no belly fat.
Foods containing additives such as nitrates, MSG and sulfites should be avoided. Chemicals found in all of these products can be damaging to the body and should be eliminated as much as possible. Eat foods that have a lower fat content, and include exercise on a regular basis. You may have seen this before, that a diet low in fat is much better than one loaded with fat. This is no different for lowering the risk of an enlarged prostate. A prostate diet would not be complete without at least five daily servings of veggies. Drinking two glasses of your favorite wine a day is also found to lower the risk. However, excessive alcohol is linked to other ailments and this tip should be done in moderation.
Additionally, for those with a taste of a more scientific approach to the importance of diet on the prostate, I have this extract for you from the American journal of epidemiology which studied the role of milk on the prostate: “The authors investigated whether early-life residency in certain areas of Iceland marked by distinct differences in milk intake was associated with risk of prostate cancer in a population-based cohort of 8,894 men born between 1907 and 1935. Through linkage to cancer and mortality registers, the men were followed for prostate cancer diagnosis and mortality from study entry (in waves from 1967 to 1987) through 2009. In 2002–2006, a subgroup of 2,268 participants reported their milk intake in early, mid-, and current life. During a mean follow-up period of 24.3 years, 1,123 men were diagnosed with prostate cancer, including 371 with advanced disease (stage 3 or higher or prostate cancer death). Compared with early-life residency in the capital area, rural residency in the first 20 years of life was marginally associated with increased risk of advanced prostate cancer (hazard ratio = 1.29, 95% confidence interval (CI): 0.97, 1.73), particularly among men born before 1920 (hazard ratio = 1.64, 95% CI: 1.06, 2.56). Daily milk consumption in adolescence (vs. less than daily), but not in midlife or currently, was associated with a 3.2-fold risk of advanced prostate cancer (95% CI: 1.25, 8.28). These data suggest that frequent milk intake
in adolescence increases risk of advanced prostate cancer.