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This makes a lot of sense (about insulin levels in bc patients). I do think you have to think about it in "general" terms however. If one thinks about the benign studies that just came out about exercise cutting recurrence and low fat diets cutting recurrence (and take into account that being overweight is a big risk factor). All these things increase the amounts of insulin and estrogen (both potent hormones) in the body.
Reducing both by diet and exercise (or a drug) is helpful. Then think about if one is ER/PR positive. You take Arimidex (or another AI) and reduce your chance of recurrence (let's say you are only ER/PR positive and not Her 2). However, it does not work in every case. Some people still recur. Why??? Other mechanisms are involved too - insulin? prostaglandin? (this is a huge factor in my opinion - I will explain)
Everybody makes cholestrol (whether or not you eat too much of it or saturated fat - think low fat diet here). You need cholesterol because your body converts it to the sex hormones (estrogen, progesterone and testosterone) and it also converts it to prostaglandins (they cause inflammation and pain/cramps). (This is why I think a low fat diet helps - cuts cholestrol levels hence hormone and prostaglandin levels and why I think statins improve bc rates).
Exercise helps with insulin levels and reduces body fat (that makes excess estrogens).
The role of insulin is more unclear to me because it is a humongous molecule (and smaller molecules seem to be better culprits) but insulin does have receptors on the surfaces of ALL cells (creates a "window" for glucose to enter the cell for energy).
I say you need to explore various routes at once because I think bc (and all cancers) come about from faulty mechanisms and not a faulty mechanism (there ends up being a straw that breaks the camel's back).
I am just thinking out loud here and I hope no one is angry.
Warm regards
Becky
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