The Boston Globe (9/27, Blake) “Nutrition and You!” blog reports that “a poor diet, specifically one that is skimpy on fruits and vegetables, may also play a role” in colon cancer, according to a study published in the October issue of the Journal of the American Dietetic Association. Researchers found that “cruciferous vegetables, including Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, and broccoli were associated with a reduced incidence of proximal and distal cancers. A diet abundant in both fruits and veggies, especially apples and dark yellow vegetables, such as carrots and pumpkin, appeared to decrease the risk of distal cancer.”

        HealthDay (9/27, Preidt) reports that to reach these conclusions, “researchers examined the diets of 918 colorectal cancer patients and 1,021 people with no history of the disease.” WebMD (9/27, Rubin) and the Toronto Sun /QMI Agency (9/27) also report this study.

HealthDay (9/15, Behen) reports that according to a study published in the New England Journal of Medicine, a new drug regimen for hepatitis C composed of “peginterferon and ribavirin, two drugs that have been the standard of care for hepatitis C for more than a decade,” and “a recently approved hepatitis C medication called telaprevir,” a protease inhibitor, can cure patients “in half the normal time.” In particular, “tailoring patients’ treatment regimen to their response to the drugs, which is known as response-guided therapy, enabled many patients to cut treatment time in half.” Hepatitis C “can lead to liver cancer and is the number one cause of liver transplants in the United States.”

        MedPage Today (9/15, Smith) reports that patients “patients who responded early and strongly” and consequently received “the shorter therapy had significantly fewer adverse events.” Those “who did not have an extended rapid response…were nonrandomly assigned to the longer treatment arm.” Notably, 92% of early responders and 88% of the rest “sustained virologic response — defined as undetectable HCV both at the end of treatment and 24 weeks later.” Medscape (9/15, Hitt) also covers the story.

Reuters (9/3, Pittman) reported that according to a study in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, people with the highest daily folate intake had a 30% less risk of colorectal cancer than those with lower intakes. Todd Gibson of the National Cancer Institute, however, was quoted as saying that folate’s effect is “definitely still an open question.” Reuters noted the study does not show any harm in taking more folate than the daily recommended amount, which had been a previous concern.