Exercise helps to suppress cancer

Exercise may be a key weapon in cancer patients’ battle against the disease, according to a new study conducted by Edith Cowan University (ECU) and published in the journal Medicine & Science in Sports & Exercise. This is because exercise causes muscles to secrete proteins called myokines into our blood; researchers from ECU’s Exercise Medicine Research Institute have learned these myokines can suppress tumour growth and even help actively fight cancerous cells.

A clinical trial saw obese prostate cancer patients undergo regular exercise training for 12 weeks, giving blood samples before and after the exercise program. The researchers then took the samples and applied them directly onto living prostate cancer cells.

“The patients’ levels of anti-cancer myokines increased in the three months,” said study supervisor Professor Robert Newton.

“When we took their pre-exercise blood and their post-exercise blood and placed it over living prostate cancer cells, we saw a significant suppression of the growth of those cells from the post-training blood.

“That’s quite substantial, indicating chronic exercise creates a cancer-suppressive environment in the body,” Prof Newton said. The results help explain why cancer progresses more slowly in patients who exercise, he added.

PhD candidate and research lead Jin-Soo Kim said while myokines could signal cancer cells to grow more slowly — or stop completely — they are unable to kill the cells by themselves. However, he said myokines can team up with other cells in the blood to actively fight cancer.

“Myokines in and of themselves don’t signal the cells to die,” Kim said.

“But they do signal our immune cells — T cells — to attack and kill the cancer cells.”

Prof Newton said exercise also complements other prostate cancer treatments such as androgen deprivation therapy (ADT), which is both effective and commonly prescribed but can also lead to significant reduction in lean mass and an increase in fat mass — which can result in sarcopenic obesity (being obese with low muscle mass), poorer health and cancer outcomes. The ECU study participants were undergoing ADT and were obese, with the training program seeing them maintain lean mass while losing fat mass.

The study focused on prostate cancer due it being the most common non-skin cancer among men and the high number of patient fatalities; however, Prof Newton said the findings could have a wider impact.

“We believe this mechanism applies to all cancers,” he said.

ECU is now carrying out further studies, including a trial where patients with advanced-stage prostate cancer are put through a six-month exercise program. Though results are still pending, Prof Newton said the preliminary findings are encouraging.

“These men have high disease burden, extensive treatment side effects and are very unwell, but they still can produce anti-cancer medicine from within,” he said.

“It’s important as it may indicate why men even with advanced cancer, if they’re physically active, don’t succumb as quickly.”

Image credit: ©stock.adobe.com/au/Mladen

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