Health Diet

Healthy diet ***

Strapline:

Maintaining a healthy diet will give you more energy, strength and help your body’s natural healing process.

Headline/overview

This section aims to help you make simple changes to your diet which can help support your body, give you more strength and energy and help your body cells to grow and repair. There are many positive steps you can take to have a healthy diet and many resources you can use to help you.

Approval score:

We gave this our maximum approval score of 3 stars, meaning there is good evidence of benefit.

How does this work?

You will be given advice on starchy foods, consumption of fruit and vegetables, limiting your salt and saturated fat intake, including some dairy products and also some advice on dietary supplements.

What are the benefits?

Eating a healthy diet will give you more energy, strength, help your body cells to grow and repair and can help reduce the risk of some cancers developing or of a cancer returning.

What is the evidence?

The evidence tells us that eating as well as you can will help your body to fight infection and cope with the side effects of treatment. 

Who would this be good for?

This section offers advice on eating healthily after you have finished and recovered from your cancer treatment. If you are unsure whether you are at this stage, please check with your doctor.

Who should be careful?

This section is aimed at people who are not underweight. If you are underweight, have experienced significant weight loss during your treatment, have swallowing difficulties or bowel problems or have had surgery affecting your digestive system, please speak to your doctor or dietician.

Myth busting

‘Superfoods’ - There isn't any scientific evidence for any one particular food being a 'superfood'. The greatest benefit to your health is likely to come from eating a balanced diet that includes a wide and varied combination of foods.

So instead of looking for a 'superfood', it’s better to aim for a 'superdiet' as recommended in healthy eating guidelines. This will help you make sure you’re getting the widest possible variety of these substances. It will also make your diet more enjoyable and interesting, and it will probably be cheaper too.

What do I need to do?

Check with your doctor before making any significant changes to your diet.

Whether you choose to make small or big changes to your diet, it may take time to find healthy foods that you like, or a diet that works for you. It can help to try different foods. This can stop you getting bored and may help motivate you to continue a healthy diet in the long-term.

The Christie’s Eating well booklet includes dietary recommendations to help you eat well following your cancer treatment and recovery, including advice to:

1. Base your meals on starchy foods.

2. Eat lots of fruit and vegetables.

3. Limit consumption of red meat and avoid processed meats.

4. Limit consumption of high energy foods (foods high in saturated fat and/or sugar).

5. Limit consumption of salty foods.

6. Include some dairy products daily.

7. Don’t use supplements to protect against cancer.

Each section of the online booklet explains more about the food groups, how much of them to include, why we should be eating these foods in the amounts advised and some tips to help you put this advice in to practice.

Once you have decided on your concerns and how you would to help yourself, download the Eating well booklet on eating well to help yourself. 

Setting goals and monitoring your progress

You may want to make changes to your diet gradually, at a comfortable pace, at a budget you can afford, and when you feel ready. You could start by writing down what you normally eat for a few weeks. Compare this with information on healthy eating. Then set yourself some small, realistic goals, and decide how you will achieve them. Week by week, continue to record how you feel and your energy levels through the PlanBe programme.

Summary

·      Eating a healthy diet will help support your body

·      There are many resources that can help you to do this

·      Keeping a diary will help you to understand your eating habits and how to modify these accordingly

Resources

Your local GP, hospital or cancer therapy centre will have lots of advice on how to eat healthily.  Some will hold local health and wellbeing events.  Contact your local centre for more information.

Visit the Christie’s online resources on diet and nutrition.  In addition, Macmillan's resources on diet and cancer are helpful as are those of Cancer Research UK.