Broccoli Sprouts May Protect Against a Cancerous Bladder

A concentration of broccoli sprouts reduced the
development of bladder tumors in an animal model
by more than half, according to a report in the
March 1 issue of Cancer Research, a journal of
the American Association for Cancer Research.

This finding reinforces human epidemiologic studies
that have suggested that eating cruciferous vegetables
like broccoli is associated with reduced risk for
bladder cancer, according to the studies senior
investigator, Yuesheng Zhang, MD, PhD, professor
of oncology at Roswell Park Cancer Institute.
“Although this is an animal study, it provides
potent evidence that eating vegetables is beneficial
in bladder cancer prevention,” he said.

There is strong evidence that the protective action
of cruciferous vegetables derives at least in part
from isothyiocyanates (ITCs), a group of phytochemicals
with well-known cancer preventive activities.

“The bladder is particularly responsive to this group
of natural chemicals,” Zhang said. “In our experiments,
the broccoli sprout ITCs after oral administration
were selectively delivered to the bladder tissues
through urinary excretion.”

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Broccoli sprouts have approximately 30 times more ITCs
than mature broccoli, and the sprout extract used by
the researchers contains approximately 600 times as
much.

Although animals that had the most protection against
development of bladder cancer were given high doses
of the extract, Zhang said humans at increased risk
for this cancer likely do not need to eat huge amounts
of broccoli sprouts in order to derive protective
benefits.

“Epidemiologic studies have shown that dietary ITCs
and cruciferous vegetable intake are inversely
associated with bladder cancer risk in humans. It
is possible that ITC doses much lower than those
given to the rats in this study may be adequate
for bladder cancer prevention,” he said.

Zhang and his colleagues tested the ability of
the concentrate to prevent bladder tumors in
five groups of rats. The first group acted as a
control, while the second group was given only
the broccoli extract to test for safety. The
remaining three groups were given a chemical, N-butyl-N-(4-hydroxybutyl) nitrosamine (BBN)
in drinking water, which induces bladder cancer.
Two of these groups were given the broccoli
extract in diet, beginning two weeks before
the carcinogenic chemical was delivered.

In the control group and the group given only
the extract, no tumors developed, and there was
no toxicity from the extract in the rats.

About 96 percent of animals given only BBN
developed an average of almost two tumors each
of varying sizes. By comparison, about 74 percent
of animals given a low dose of the extract
developed cancer, and the number of tumors per
rat was 1.39. The group given the high dose of
extract had even fewer tumors. About 38 percent
of this high-dose group developed cancer, and the
average number of tumors per animal was only .46
and, unlike the other animals, the majority were
very small in size.

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