Dairy and prostate cancer: Conflicting information

There appears to be no consensus on this. Perhaps the larger picture indicates one should consider avoiding the "Western Diet" and not focus on one food.

Stay Strong Brother.

I also find many conflicting studies and many, many “meta analyses” that only summarize data from other studies. Until I read the results of an actual study that finds otherwise, I am following the diet guidelines of the Prostate Cancer Foundation (https://www.pcf.org/prostate-cancer-and-eggs-dairy-supplements-your-questions-answered-part-1/) and do not consume animal based dairy products.

My oncologist recommended that I go on a plant based diet which excludes meat, eggs, diary, cheese and I have do so. I miss cheese the most but I have discovered that there are many good plant substitutes for the foods that I used to eat. I am G 9, CR. PC and doing all that I can to keep kicking.

I understand the motivation — cancer is terrifying, and every new study we hear about feels like a new straw we can grasp at. But I suggest taking isolated studies with a big grain of salt (or non-sodium substitute 🙂 ).

Even if a statistically-significant correlation between dairy and cancer showed up in multiple studies (and most of these are non-reproduceable one-offs that get too much media attention), it alone wouldn't establish causation — it could be that people who like milk and people who have a predisposition to prostate cancer have a third factor X in common, like one of the genetic mutations that give some people high lactose tolerance (just to pick something at random).

One of my favourite illustrations of correlation vs causation is how when ice cream sales go up, so do shark attacks. That doesn't mean that avoiding ice cream would protect you from sharks; just that they're both related to a third factor (in this case, hot days).

We can trust that as soon as there's credible evidence that anything in our diet — other than the standard advice of eating a moderate, healthy, balanced diet — has a strong causal relationship with prostate cancer, our oncology teams will not only tell us but nag the heck out of us over it, because they want us to live longer and better.

Thank you for sharing that link. In the article, Dr Kenfield recommends eating a maximum of 2 eggs/week (if you're including the yolk) and avoiding high-fat dairy, but also says that "Low-fat and non-fat dairy are not consistently associated with bad prostate cancer outcomes."

That said, there's nothing wrong with choosing to consume non-dairy products like oat milk, so if you prefer it, go for it! For a lot of people, it might even improve their digestive health, because many people have trouble with lactose.

On the recent webinar that has been discussed on this site, they had a presentation on diet and prostate cancer. To answer your question about milk, it was recommended to drink plant based milk ONLY. The brand recommended was Ripple, which I now drink everyday. There are four different Ripple options. It is very tasty. When I met with my Urologist recently, his only diet recommendation was to give up red meat completely. For me that was easy as I gave it up 20 years ago. Hope this helps. Good luck🤞

Any chance your doctor is Ken Jacobsohn in Milwaukee? He suggest whole-foods plant-based (WFPB) diets to his urology oncology patients. If you read "How Not to Die" by Dr. Michael Greger, he has a chapter devoted to prostate cancer. It's pretty compelling. Our household now eats WFPB about 90% of the time. Cholesterol has dropped significantly as a nice additional benefit.

My Doc never said anything about diet I will look for the book

i have the book "Preventing Prostate Cancer..." Benny Gavi MD(Stanford)
He recommends avoiding Dairy, Eggs, Red and processed meat. He has a list of studies cited and he wants us to read those studies and make our own decision.
Myself, I try to practice what Dean Ornish preaches as much as I can.

I have been making my own plant-based milk ever since I read book "The Detox Prescription" by Woodson Merrell MD around 2014. I just finished having my morning Espresso Coffee with Almond Milk I made yesterday.
Just soak almonds for about 8 hours, peel the skin, blend with one Medjool Date(optional) in Vitamix or another high-speed blender. If you don't want to peel, you can strain with cheese cloth, but you lose the fiber! If you are in hurry, you can soak almonds in hot water to peel the skin.
Also, I love following the 21 day plan in that book. I used to do 7 plan often. I should start again!