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IGF-1 as One-Stop Cancer Shop

Insulin-like growth factor (IGF-1) is a natural human growth hormone instrumental in normal growth during childhood, but in adulthood can promote abnormal growth—the proliferation, spread (metastasis), and invasion of cancer.

September 25, 2012 |
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IGF-1 as One-Stop Cancer Shop, 4.8 out of 5 based on 5 ratings

Sources Cited

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Zhang Y, Ma B, Fan Q. Mechanisms of breast cancer bone metastasis. Cancer Lett. 2010 Jun 1;292(1):1-7.

Kleinberg DL, Wood TL, Furth PA, Lee AV. Growth hormone and insulin-like growth factor-I in the transition from normal mammary development to preneoplastic mammary lesions. Endocr Rev. 2009 Feb;30(1):51-74.

Salvioli S, Capri M, Bucci L, Lanni C, Racchi M, Uberti D, Memo M, Mari D, Govoni S, Franceschi C. Why do centenarians escape or postpone cancer? The role of IGF-1, inflammation and p53. Cancer Immunol Immunother. 2009 Dec;58(12):1909-17.

Endogenous Hormones and Breast Cancer Collaborative Group, Key TJ, Appleby PN, Reeves GK, Roddam AW. Insulin-like growth factor 1 (IGF1), IGF binding protein 3 (IGFBP3), and breast cancer risk: pooled individual data analysis of 17 prospective studies. Lancet Oncol. 2010 Jun;11(6):530-42

Rowlands MA, Gunnell D, Harris R, Vatten LJ, Holly JM, Martin RM. Circulating insulin-like growth factor peptides and prostate cancer risk: a systematic review and meta-analysis. Int J Cancer. 2009 May 15;124(10):2416-29.

Gronek, Piotr ; Rychlewski, Tadeusz ; Słomski, Ryszard ; Stankiewicz, Krystyna ; Lehmann, Joanna. Insulin-like growth factor 1. Studies in Physical Culture and Tourism. 2005;12(1).

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Acknowledgements

Images thanks to: Danielle Keller via Wikimedia Commons and SanShoot.

Transcript

Why do centenarians escape cancer?—people who live to be over a hundred years old.

 As we get older… our risk of getting and dying from cancer grows year by year—but, once you hit about 85 90, your cancer risk starts to drop.

Kinda makes sense; I mean if you didn’t get it by then maybe you’re never going to get it. If you live that long maybe it’s a sign that there something special about you. It seems that centernarians are endowed with a particular resistance to cancer. So what’s their secret?

Every day, 50 billion of our cells die. And every day, 50 billion new ones are born. There’s a balance. Otherwise your body would atrophy,—shrink—or get too big and crowded.

Now sometimes we need grow, like when we’re a baby, or that growth spurt around puberty. Our cells don’t get larger when we grow up, they get more numerous. A child's hand may only be made up of about 50 billion cells, and may have to add half trillion or so growing up.

Once we've already grown up we don’t want a lot of extra cells hanging around. We still need our cells to grow and divide—out with the old; in with the new. We just don’t want to be making more cells than we're putting out to pasture. When you’re a kid extra growth can be good; when you’re an adult, extra growth can mean a tumor.

How do our cells know when to tip the scale in favor of more dividing and less dying and when to come back into balance? A key signal is IGF-1, a growth hormone called insulin-like growth factor #1. Levels goes up when you’re s kid so you grow and then comes back down. Should your levels stay a bit too high as an adult, though, there’s this constant message to your cells grow, grow, grow, divide, don’t die, keep going, keep growing. And so not surprisingly, the more IGF-1 you have in your bloodstream, the higher your risk for cancer. More IGF, more prostate cancer… more IGF, more breast cancer;

Of course it’s not the original tumor that tends to kill you, it's the metastases. IGF-1 is a growth factor, it helps things grow, so it helps cancer cells break off from the main tumor, migrate into surrounding tissues, and invade the bloodstream. What do you think helps breast cancer get into the bone? IGF-1… and the liver, IGF1. lung, brain, lymph nodes. IGF-1, helps transform normal cells into cancer cells in the first place, then helps them survive, proliferate, self-renew, grow, migrate, invade, stabilize into new tumors, and even helps hook up the blood supply to the new tumor. IGF-1 is a growth hormone that, makes things grow—that's what it does. But too much growth when we're all grown up can mean cancer.

[Let’s turn next to how we can prevent all this.]

To see any graphs, charts, graphics, images, and quotes to which Dr. Greger may be referring watch the above video. This is just an approximation of the audio contributed by Kerry Skinner.

To help out on the site please email volunteer@nutritionfacts.org

Dr. Michael Greger

Doctor's Note

This video seems like a departure from the last 5 videos, which describes an Ex Vivo Cancer Proliferation Bioassay, but those who've seen my full-length presentation Uprooting the Leading Causes of Death know that this all circles around in the end. I've touched on IGF-1 before in Daily Hormonal Interference and Meat Hormones & Female Infertility, but soon you'll know everything you wanted to about it (but may have been afraid to ask!).

If you haven't yet, you can subscribe to my videos for free by clicking here.

For some more context, check out my associated blog posts: Eating To Extend Our Lifespan, Stool Size and Breast Cancer Risk, How Do Plant-Based Diets Fight Cancer?, and  Animal Protein and the Cancer Promoter IGF-1.

  • http://nutritionfacts.org/ Michael Greger M.D.

    This video seems like a departure from the last 5 videos, which describes an Ex Vivo Cancer Proliferation Bioassay, but those who’ve seen my full-length presentation Uprooting the Leading Causes of Death know that this all circles around in the end. I’ve touched on IGF-1 before in Daily Hormonal Interference and Meat Hormones & Female Infertility, but soon you’ll know everything you wanted to about it (but may have been afraid to ask!).

    If you haven’t yet, you can subscribe to my videos for free by clicking here.

  • Basskills

    How is this different from Human Growth Hormone for muscle building?

    • Toxins

      Its the same hormone actually. The supplement industry for bodybuilders has a very damaging impact on those consuming their products. Little do people know that most of the supplements they take is either useless or harmful.

  • SJS

    IGF-1 seems to be very closely linked to overall dietary protein intake…would be interested to get your thoughts on this..

  • Teresa Amo

    Can’t wait to hear the prevention part of this.

    • Noah

       Me too, I hope there will be some videos on what foods will contain or make the body produce more of this hormone.

  • http://profile.yahoo.com/KUSZH4JCJXBWTORBG5T2XTQ5RI Massimo

    I guess that in the next videos you are going to show that bovine IGF-1 is identical to human IGF-1, that it survives digestion, and eventually enters circulation to boost the endogenous levels of IGF-1. Which means, cow milk is the best way to promote cancer.

    • http://twitter.com/JenDiggityDirt JenDiggityDirt

       I hope so. If not identical then similar enough that we cannot discount that cow milk hormone may affect us in similar way. I mean we ARE drinking a milk that is meant to make animals grow. We are animals. The only ones that drink milk into adulthood and the only ones that drink milk from another species, they say. I just can’t believe that if it were a good practice that nature would have just goofed and not made it a natural food for animals. We need to stop thinking we know so much more than what the natural world is screaming at us. I believe our bodies are BEGGING us to stop consuming dairy and the horrible end result of us ignoring them is disease. Animals aren’t as sick as we are in nature and surely much of that is the result of eating their perfect natural diet. We need to just eat our perfect natural diet. There is a bounty out there and dairy isn’t part of it.

      • Ginny

        Agree..

         Re.animals:  they are sick and die young ..because of the polluted environment man has created and because we keep moving their habitat. 

      • Mings

        Read Weston Price: “Nutrition and Degenerative Diseases” it can be found by googling the name of the book and Pottinger-Price.

    • Toxins

      Actually, the point Dr. Greger is going to make is that its the type of protein consumed that triggers our own liver to upregulate IGF-1 production.

  • Shane Jackson

    A little scary considering all the ads for various supplements in lifting and fitness magazines for IGF-1 precursors and such

  • Rhmentzer

    If IGF-1 promotes growth in children, does a vegen diet slow growth in children?

    • Toxins

      No, a high meat diet has the potential to put children at risk for early puberty, which puts them at risk for chronic illnesses later in life. Children have naturally elevated levels of IGF-1 in their body. Eating vegan does not hamper this level.

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