Search

Abstract Background The prevalence of breast cancer and its mortality rate are increasing rapidly among women worldwide. On other hand, the courses of chemotherapy as the main treatment for these patients are too much exhaustive and annoying. This study was designed to evaluate the use of synbiotics (probiotics + prebiotics) supplementation as a safe and inexpensive adjuvant treatment in reducing common chemotherapy side effects in women with breast cancer. Methods The current study was conducted on 67 women with definitive diagnosis of breast cancer who were hospitalized to receive one-day chemotherapy sessions, and met the inclusion criteria. The patients were randomly allocated to the intervention or control group to receive synbiotics or placebo, respectively. They received oral consumption of synbiotics supplements twice a day for 8 weeks. The primary outcome was the changes in severity or experience of chemotherapy complication, analyzed by intention to treat (ITT). The instruments included 7 validated questionnaires which were used to assess chemotherapy complications in the initiation, 4 weeks and 8 weeks after intervention. Dietary intake was measured by 24-h dietary recall at the beginning, week 4 and week 8. Data were analyzed by SPSS software version 24. P-value

Background: The prevalence of breast cancer and its mortality rate are increasing rapidly among women worldwide. On other hand, the courses of chemotherapy as the main treatment for these patients are too much exhaustive and annoying. This study was designed to evaluate the use of synbiotics (probiotics + prebiotics) supplementation as a safe and inexpensive adjuvant treatment in reducing common chemotherapy side effects in women with breast cancer. Methods: The current study was conducted on 67 women with definitive diagnosis of breast cancer who were hospitalized to receive one-day chemotherapy sessions, and met the inclusion criteria. The patients were randomly allocated to the intervention or control group to receive synbiotics or placebo, respectively. They received oral consumption of synbiotics supplements twice a day for 8 weeks. The primary outcome was the changes in severity or experience of chemotherapy complication, analyzed by intention to treat (ITT). The instruments included 7 validated questionnaires which were used to assess chemotherapy complications in the initiation, 4 weeks and 8 weeks after intervention. Dietary intake was measured by 24-h dietary recall at the beginning, week 4 and week 8. Data were analyzed by SPSS software version 24. P-value < 0.05 was considered as statistically significant. Results: 67 breast cancer patients participated in the study. 8 weeks after intervention and adjusting the confounders, the severity of chemotherapy complications including unnormal defecation (P = 0.005) and fatigue (P < 0/001) decreased significantly in the synbiotics group compared to the placebo group. Furthermore, nausea/vomiting (P = 0.015), and anorexia (P < 0.001) were decreased at the end of the study compared to the first visit, but it was not statistically significant compared to the placebo group. Conclusions: Synbiotics supplementation during chemotherapy can potentially reduce the severity of fatigue and abnormal defecation. It can help reduce anorexia and nausea/vomiting. Trial Registration: This study was registered in the Iranian Registry of Clinical Trials (IRCT) (registered code: IRCT20091114002709N56) (date of registration: 5/5/2021). Direct link to the trial page: . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The risk of developing colorectal cancer (CRC) could be associated with red and processed meat intake. Experimental data supports that hemin iron, found abundantly in red meat, promotes CRC in mice and rats, while indole-3 carbinol (I3C) and synbiotics (syn) exert anti-carcinogenic activities in most studies of colon carcinogenesis. This study aimed to investigate the modifying effects of I3C and syn (inulin + Bifidobacterium lactis ), given separately or together, on dimethylhidrazine (DMH)-induced colon carcinogenesis in hemin-fed rats. All animals were given four subcutaneous DMH injections and then, two weeks after carcinogen exposure, they began a basal diet containing hemin, hemin + I3C, hemin + syn, or hemin + I3C + syn for 23 weeks. The combination of I3C + syn significantly increased fecal water genotoxicity, tumor volume and invasiveness when compared to the hemin-fed control group. The groups fed I3C or syn alone had a significant reduction in the number of preneoplastic aberrant crypt foci (ACF) lesions compared to the hemin-fed group. Dietary I3C also reduced fecal water genotoxicity. Gene expression analysis of colorectal tumors demonstrated that the combination of dietary I3C + syn increased transcript levels for Raf1 and decreased tumor progression and invasiveness related to the genes Cdh1 and Appl1 . This analysis also revealed that the Tnf and Cdh1 genes were significantly up- and down-regulated, respectively, in tumors of rats that received I3C, in comparison with the hemin-fed group. These findings reveal that the joint administration of I3C and syn enhanced the development of colon tumors induced by DMH in hemin-fed rats, while they potentially reduced ACF development when given alone. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]