Benefits Of Pomegranate Juice

Pomegranate Juice

Cancer-fighting chemicals are found in many foods. One food rich in these kinds of chemicals is pomegranate juice.

In two recent studies it was found that pomegranate juice may help fight prostate cancer. In one study, scientists cultivated cells from highly aggressive cases of human prostate cancer in tissue cultures.

Drinking 8 ounces of pomegranate juice daily may slow the progression of localized prostate cancer that is prostate cancer that hasn’t spread, a recent study shows.

The study included 48 men who had surgery or radiation therapy to treat localized prostate cancer.

Pomegranate fruit extracts slowed the growth of the cultured cancer cells and promoted cell death. The researchers then implanted the cancer cells in mice. A group of mice that received water laced with pomegranate juice developed significantly smaller tumors than the untreated animals. In a preliminary study of men with prostate cancer, pomegranate juice lengthened patients’ PSA doubling time (the longer the doubling time, the slower the tumor is growing) from 15 months before treatment to 54 months on the juice.

When the study started in 2003, the men’s PSA levels were doubling every 15 months. In prostate cancer patients, PSA (prostate specific antigen) is used to monitor their cancer.

All of the men drank 8 ounces of pomegranate juice daily, and that slowed down the time it took for their PSA levels to double, as the researchers reported in 2006.

In 2007, another team of researchers bought pomegranates, made their own pomegranate juice, and tested it against human prostate cancer cells grafted into mice. Those tumors grew slower than other tumors treated with a placebo solution.

Prostate cancer patients with rising PSA levels usually opt for treatment with drugs that block testosterone. This “chemical castration” can have serious side effects, including bone loss, depressiondepression, and sexual dysfunction. It’s possible that drinking pomegranate juice can delay the need for such treatments.

Only purchase juice that is 100-percent pomegranate juice. Pomegranate juice “cocktail” or pomegranate juice mixed with others types of juices will not provide you with the same benefits provided by pure pomegranate juice.