Patients treated for early stage colon cancer fared significantly better if they exercised regularly at the level of an hour's walk six times a week.

A person's risk of having a cancer recurrence or dying was lowered by 40 to 50 percent in the 2 1/3 to 3 years following surgery and chemotherapy for stage III colon cancer, reported a team headed by Jeffrey Meyerhardt, of Dana-Farber Cancer Institute.

Although exercise has previously been shown to lower the risk of developing colon cancer, the new findings are the first to demonstrate a benefit for patients who already have the disease.

" There is a growing body of evidence that there are things you can do in addition to chemotherapy for colon cancer survivors to reduce the likelihood that the disease will recur, " says Meyerhardt, at Harvard Medical School.

The health benefit was found among patients whose activity levels ranked in the top two-fifths of the group, compared to the lowest one-fifth. They exercised at a rate of at least 18 MET-hours ( metabolic-equivalent tasks ) per week, which could be attained through jogging two to three hours a week, playing tennis a few times a week, or walking briskly an hour a day six times a week, explains Meyerhardt.

The study involved patients reporting leisure-time physical activity approximately 12-18 months after surgery.
The patients belonged to the same group in which a separate study headed by Dana-Farber researcher Charles Fuchs, revealed that regular Aspirin use reduce recurrence and death risks by about the same magnitude as exercise.

Source: 41st Annual Meeting of the American Society of Clinical Oncology ( ASCO ), 2005


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