Abstract
The number of cancer cases worldwide keeps growing unstoppably, despite the undeniable advances achieved by basic research and clinical practice. Urologic tumors, including some as prevalent as prostate, bladder or kidney tumors, are no exceptions to this rule. Moreover, the fact that many of these tumors are detected in early stages lengthens the duration of their treatment, with a significant increase in health care costs. In this scenario, prevention offers the most cost-effective long-term strategy for the global control of these diseases. Although specialized diets are not the only way to decrease the chances to develop cancer, epidemiological evidence support the role of certain plant-derived foods in the prevention of urologic cancer. In many cases, these plants are rich in antiangiogenic phytochemicals, which could be responsible for their protective or angiopreventive properties. Angiogenesis inhibition may contribute to slow down the progression of the tumor at very different stages and, for this reason, angiopreventive strategies could be implemented at different levels of chemoprevention, depending on the targeted population. In this review, epidemiological evidence supporting the role of certain plant-derived foods in urologic cancer prevention are presented, with particular emphasis on their content in bioactive phytochemicals that could be used in the angioprevention of cancer.
Highlights
Accepted: 18 January 2022The burden of cancer incidence and mortality is rapidly growing worldwide due to aging and growth of the population, and to changes in the prevalence of several risk factors, many of which might be associated with social and economic development
Tumor initialization does not entirely rely on angiogenesis, the formation of new blood vessels is required to ensure the supply of oxygen, growth factors and nutrients once the tumor is bigger than few millimeters [48]
Many of these plant-derived foods are rich in phytochemicals exhibiting a relevant antiangiogenic activity
Summary
The burden of cancer incidence and mortality is rapidly growing worldwide due to aging and growth of the population, and to changes in the prevalence of several risk factors, many of which might be associated with social and economic development. With an estimated prevalence that can reach up to 60% in men at the of age of 80 [13], and given that most of the tumors are slow-growing, doctors frequently opt to preserve the quality of life of the prostate cancer patients and recommend active surveillance [14]. Patients who are being monitored through active surveillance seek a more proactive approach, being receptive to assume changes in their lifestyle or use preventive drugs that could lead to slow the disease progression. This is the main idea behind cancer chemoprevention, a term firstly defined by Michael B. In spite of some controversial results obtained in some reported preventive interventions, it is becoming increasingly clear that successful interventions for modifiable lifestyle factors should minimize economic burdens and deliver efficient care to relatively large patient populations [19]
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