Calcium, Vitamin D Work
Together to Fight Cancer

Several reports have linked calcium and vitamin D with protection against colon cancer. Now, new study findings suggest that calcium and vitamin D act together to achieve this effect.

Although calcium and vitamin D collaborate in bone growth, it was unclear if they work together to prevent the colon polyps that lead to cancer. In the new study, Dr. Maria V. Grau, from Dartmouth Medical School in Lebanon, New Hampshire, and colleagues assessed the effects of calcium use and vitamin D levels on polyp formation in 803 subjects who've had such polyps before.

The new findings are presented in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute.

At low levels of vitamin D, calcium use had no effect on polyp formation, the researchers note. At higher levels, however, calcium use was associated with a 29 percent reduction in the risk of polyp recurrence.

Conversely, the authors found that vitamin D levels only had an effect on recurrence when subjects used calcium supplements. Among calcium users, the risk of recurrence fell as vitamin D levels increased.

The variations in the vitamin D receptor did not influence the recurrence risk or alter the association between vitamin D levels and calcium use.

Further studies are needed to uncover the mechanisms underlying the interaction between vitamin D and calcium, the authors state. "Nevertheless, these data clearly suggest the potential for important (preventive) effects from calcium and vitamin D."

SOURCE: Journal of the National Cancer Institute, December 3, 2003.

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