Functional foods and nutraceuticals, wonders in cancer risks - a review

Cancer is a major cause of death in the world. Common cancers include prostate cancer, breast cancer, bladder cancer, colorectal cancer, and skin cancers. Treatment of cancer is very expensive hence the need to prevent the condition primarily, or even secondarily. Foods, like chemicals, have cumulative effects and contain substances both essential and non-essential which have been shown to be healthy. This led to acclamation and acceptance of certain foods as providing health benefits – functional foods. Functional foods and nutraceuticals are chemopreventive to cancers as evidenced by different researches conducted over the years. This does not conclude that functional foods and nutraceuticals have an all-preventive effect because some research findings implicate them in cancer risks and progression. This review aims to discuss some of these foods and the chemoprotective compounds therein to aid further clinical studies. Foods investigated for their role in cancer risks and included in this review are: grapes, tomatoes, red peppers, berries, chestnut, ginseng, Rhodiola, green tea, soy, garlic, and cruciferous vegetables. This review also considered the so-called antioxidant nutrients – selenium, vitamins A, B, C, D and E. Others include glucosamine, chondroitin, melatonin, MSM, which were taken as supplements. Anyway researches are still on-going relating cancers and foods as this list is supposedly not exhaustive.