Replacing some carbs with vegetable fat lowers death rate

SAN FRANCISCO, June 10 (UPI) -- Men with non-metastatic prostate cancer who replaced some carbohydrates and animal fat with vegetable fat had lower risk of dying, U.S. researchers say.

Erin L. Richman of the University of California, San Francisco, and colleagues examined fat intake in men after a diagnosis of prostate cancer in relation to lethal prostate cancer and all-cause mortality.

The study included 4,577 men diagnosed with non-metastatic prostate cancer from 1986-2010 who were enrolled in the Health Professionals Follow-up Study.

The study, published in the journal Internal Medicine, found after a midpoint follow up of 8.4 years, there were 315 lethal prostate cancer events and 1,064 deaths. Replacing 10 percent of calories from carbohydrates with vegetable fat was associated with a 29 percent lower risk of lethal prostate cancer and a 26 percent lower risk of death from all-cause mortality.

"In this prospective analysis, vegetable fat intake after diagnosis was associated with a lower risk of lethal prostate cancer and all-cause mortality," the study authors wrote in summing up their work.