Associations of Japanese food intake with survival of stomach and colorectal cancer: a prospective patient cohort study.

Dietary factors may affect the prognosis of digestive tract cancer, but evidence has been sparse. Focusing on Japanese diet, we investigated the association between pretreatment intake of six Japanese foods (including soy food, miso (soybean paste) soup and seaweed) and the risk of death among patients with histologically confirmed major digestive tract cancers (stomach, 1931; colon, 793; rectum, 510) diagnosed during 1997-2013 at a single institution in Japan. Pretreatment dietary intake was assessed using a food frequency questionnaire, and the patients were followed until December, 2016. The Cox proportional hazards model was used to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (CIs). Among the patients with stomach cancer, frequent intake of soy food was inversely associated with the risk of all-cause (Ptrend for four frequency groups = 0.01; HR = 0.72, 95% CI: 050-1.04 for highest vs. lowest group) and stomach cancer (Ptrend = 0.03; HR = 0.63, 95% CI: 040-0.99) death. A similar inverse association was also found for intake of miso soup. On the other hand, frequent seaweed intake was inversely associated with the risk of all-cause death among the patients with colon cancer (Ptrend = 0.03). Rectal cancer patients who had frequently consumed seaweed tended to have a lower risk of rectal cancer death (Ptrend = 0.02). These findings indicate that pretreatment intake of Japanese foods such as soybean products and seaweed may have favorable effects on patient survival of stomach and colorectal cancer, although this needs to be confirmed by further studies. This article is protected by copyright. All rights reserved.