30-40% increase in response to herceptin with....
 

Hello all,
I've been out of the loop for the last 2 weeks due to other obligations so I don't know if this has been posted before but here is an article where co-administration of GLA from evening primrose oil caused a 30 - 40% improved response to herceptin.
Regards and I've missed you guys
Al

http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases...1104072900.htm

Al I did post it and here was the response I got...
 

from MY dietician as well as Diane Dyer the Breast Cancer dietician.

On Wednesday, November 2, 2005, at 01:01 PM, rhonda r hoffman wrote:

Diana and Stephanie,

Please read the attached article. I was dx 2/1/05 w/ Stage 1, Grade 3, ER/PR-, No node, Her2+ Breast Cancer. I did 6 rounds of dose dense TEC (taxotere, epirubicin and cytoxan), 33 rads and am currently doing Herceptin every 3 weeks until at least 8/06. Would it HURT to take a small amount of evening primrose? I already do Diana's diet faithfully, but will add whatever I can. Thank you.


Rhonda Hoffman


http://www.northwestern.edu/newscent...linolenic.html

Rhonda,
Thank you for sharing this news release with me. It was very interesting to read. The published research is not yet available through the internet so I cannot read the entire article today. However, the same researcher also published the following article earlier this year, so it appears that he/she is working in this area of fat metabolism and gene interaction, in particular focusing on the Her-2/neu gene in breast cancer.

Ann Oncol. 2005 Mar;16(3):359-71. Epub 2005 Jan 10.
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Response from MY dietician
 

Thank you both for your information, unfortunately I am not able to provide much more insight. I did include this article referenced in the Natural Medicines Comprehensive Database for evening primrose oil. Low concentrations of GLA may stimulate the growth of breast cancer cells while higher concentrations may inhibit growth???? I would tend to agree with Diana and increase your extra-virgin olive oil 1st until better studies can be done. Please let me know if you're unable to see this abstract & I'll send you the details of it.

Rhonda, I will send you a copy of what I printed about evening primrose oil from the database I referred to above.

Stephanie Patterson, RD

Nutr Cancer. 1995;24(1):33-45.http://<font face="Arial"><font colo...</font></font> http://<font face="Arial"><font colo...</font></font>

Effects of linoleic acid and gamma-linolenic acid on the growth and metastasis of a human breast cancer cell line in nude mice and on its growth and invasive capacity in vitro.

Rose DP, Connolly JM, Liu XH.

Division of Nutrition and Endocrinology, American Health Foundation, Valhalla, NY 10595, USA.

It has been reported that gamma-linolenic acid (GLA)-rich diets suppress mammary carcinogenesis and transplanted tumor growth and that GLA inhibits the growth of cultured human cancer cell lines. We compared the effects of dietary GLA and linoleic acid (LA) on the growth of MDA-MB-435 human breast cancer cells and their expression of the metastatic phenotype in vivo and in vitro. Athymic nude mice (30/dietary group) were fed isocaloric diets containing 20% (wt/wt) fat but providing 8% GLA or LA for 7 days, and 10(6) tumor cells were then injected into a thoracic mammary fat pad. The diets were continued for a further 11 weeks. The primary tumor growth rates were similar in mice from the two dietary groups; there was a nonstatistically significant trend for the incidence of macroscopic lung metastases and the total lung metastatic volumes to be higher in the GLA-fed mice (79% and 40.1 +/- 13.9 mm3) than in the LA-fed mice (64% and 15.5 +/- 5.4 mm3). The tumor cell phospholipids from the 8% GLA-fed mice contained significantly lower LA levels but higher arachidonic acid levels (both p < 0.001) than those from 8% LA-fed mice. Also the arachidonate-derived eicosanoids (prostaglandin E, leukotriene B4, and 5-, 12-, and 15-hydroxyeicosatetraenoic acids) were significantly higher in tumors from the 8% GLA group. Zymography showed higher 92-kDa type IV collagenase activity in tumors from 8% GLA-fed mice. In vitro, GLA and LA, at 0.5-2 micrograms/ml, stimulated MDA-MB-435 cell growth; 10 micrograms/ml was mildly inhibitory. Whereas LA stimulated tumor cell invasion and 92-kDa type IV collagenase production in vitro, GLA inhibited invasion and did not induce activity of the proteolytic enzyme. Our results do not support the hypothesis that supplementation with GLA would exert a beneficial effect on the progression of an existing breast cancer, perhaps because it is metabolized in vivo to arachidonate-derived eicosanoids that are known to be involved in the metastatic process.

PMID: 7491296 [PubMed - indexed for MEDLINE]

80% of ALA
 

I was thrilled to read this article and bought a bottle of evening primrose oil , but later somebody mentioned that it contains not only GLA but in majority like 80% of it is alpha linoloc acid which is bad for Her2 according to the article posted in the submitted articles(dietery fatty acids). Also I have checked my flax seed oil container which says 80% of it is alpaha linolic acid.

I am really confused what to take and what not to take . Hope somebody can give good guidance in this matter.

Julie

Hi Al, glad to see you back; we missed you too! Thanks for the article, but like Julie I get more and more confused on this issue. Right now I don't take much in the way of supplements as per my onc, since I'm on chemo again, but I do continue to use LOTS of EVOOO (Extra Virgin Organic Olive Oil :)). I've been using it for years now.

<3 Lolly

My Naturopath said the following:
Researchers commonly use 3,000–6,000 mg of EPO per day, which provides approximately 270–540 mg of GLA. Most capsules are 1,000 mg EPO. I would start Rupali out at 4,000 mg EPO daily.

Has anyone else called up there naturopaths to ask?

A little Evening Primrose Oil...
 

goes a long way...I have been taking 500mg of evening primrose oil a day for 7 or 8 years now with nothing but excellent benefits. I think it is superior to flax seed oil for certain segments of her-2 folks.., but remember I am ER- and PR- and the whole fatty acid area is grey at best.

But still, there are a lot of good general health reasons to take a LITTLE of it. Besides supposedly helping knock back the her-2 receptors further up-stream than herceptin, it is also rich in oleic acid (main component of olive oil) and is great for improving neuropathy and keeping the blood thin and prevents your platelets from getting sticky. I really think a little couldn't hurt and could actually help. I would NOT take it in high doses though as it can make you tired and lethargic. As I mentioned early on, some people have pointed to the evening primrose in my regimen as being one important facet that has enabled me to take so much less herceptin and NO chemo all these many years. I do chew it and let the oil it dissolve in through the blood vessels in my cheeks rather than running it through the acidity of the stomach digestive process...fyi. Hope this is helpful...

My two cents,
Gina L. Popp

Is a multi-Oil supplement advisable? I have started taking one, but it does contain linoleic acid, so not sure what is best.


Sassy
________
Pornstar Cam

Dr. Rose's paper based on hormone negative human her2+ cells implanted in mice
 

MDA-MB-435 stands for human breast cancer cells which were injected into mice to do these experiments. It is a line of breast cancer cells named after its hospital of origin (MD Anderson) which has been perpetuated and used in experiments the world over. It is her2neu positive and estrogen-independent and expresses LH-RH (luteinizing hormone-releasing hormone receptors) among other things.

ONE may not be able to extrapolate from this experiment with human breast cancer cells implanted in mice what happens in people and certainly not those with her2 positive tumors which are also hormone receptor positive. Dr. Stephanie Jeffreys of Stanford University has identified three different groups of her2+ hormone+ tumors by gene signature (multi gene array), each with a different behavior.

As is usual, no simple answers unfortunately.

Hope this helps ( even if it is frustrating to realize that there is so much more that is not known than is known!)

Lani