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Dr. Abrams shares if grapes can help prevent cancer.
Dr. Abrams:
I think grapes are a good food. It’s, they are one of those heavily pigmented fruits. They have, particularly the darker grapes, they are rich in resveratrol, the darker grapes with seeds, and resveratrol is a potent antioxidant that we think somehow is related to life-prolongation.
We think that the reason the French get away with eating the diet that they do and living longer and having less heart disease and cancer than those of us in the U.S. is because they do drink a lot of red wine. So, it’s felt that the resveratrol in red wine counteracts the ill effects of some of the diet that the French consume.
So, women certainly are entitled in cancer risk reduction to only one glass of alcohol a day. Women at risk for breast cancer, it’s recommended only one glass of alcohol a week.
I recommend that if women are going to drink alcohol that they should drink red wine because it has the most health benefits. Grape, whether or not the same benefits are present in just eating grapes or drinking grape juice is something that is as yet unknown, I think.
About Dr. Abrams, M.D.:
Dr. Donald I. Abrams, M.D., a cancer specialist, is director of clinical programs at the Osher Center for Integrative Medicine at UCSF Medical Center at Mount Zion. Abrams provides integrative medicine consultations for cancer patients and has completed research in complementary and alternative therapies including mind-body treatments, botanical therapies, medical use of marijuana and traditional Chinese medicine herbal therapies.
Visit Dr. Abrams at UCSF Medical Center