Surviving Cancer Part 2 – Cancer cells versus normal cells 

I promised that I would come back to tell you what I learned about cancer. Please remember to always work with your primary physician or specialist before doing anything independently.  

Here we go! This is such a very technical area of cytology (how cells work). I will do my best to make it as simple as possible so that everyone will understand. I have to say that this is my most challenging post so far to explain. I want people to understand, at a very basic level, what is going on with cancerous cells.  

To help you improve your understanding of a normal cell versus a cancer cell, I want to talk about how the body makes energy on a cellular level (both healthy and unhealthy cells) and where it gets its energy. There are many different types of cells in the body and different types of cancer, some are more easily treated than others. Please keep in mind, my focus here is on ovarian cancer but many of the principles can be similar.  

We all know cancer cells are different and cause disease that likely will require treatment but that is not quite the same as knowing what went wrong. We need to know how cancer cells not only survive but live and thrive. In every case, it is important to know what type of cancer, how large it is, whether it has spread, and usually how it will respond to treatment.  

I remember in nursing school being so impressed with what our bodies do by gradients (positive and negative ions – much like how a battery moves electricity with a plus and minus). By changing a gradient and using hormones to communicate, the needed changes are made to keep us in balance. It is an amazing dance that takes milliseconds – we are amazing creations and our body should never be underestimated in its power.  

A normal cell:   

1. Normal cells go through a process called ‘mitosis’; which is a cell dividing into usually 2 cells, (also called “daughter cells”), each having the same makeup; same number and kind of chromosomes as the mother cell. They are like identical twins.  
2. Chromosomes are our blueprint. They are carried in the DNA that holds that information in our body for replication through our RNA to make more cells. 
3. Cells have a “lifespan” with an orderly cell death. Under normal circumstances when a cell has served its purpose or is defective; it is programmed for something called cell death (apoptosis) and then removed from the body. Through apoptosis, aging cells are then replaced by young, healthy cells. 
4. Normal cells are organized, they know what they should be doing – they are usually a “well-oiled machine”.  When they touch places they should not, however, they recognize that things are getting overly crowded.  This is called “contact inhibition” and the cells know that excessive touching of each other is not good inside your body. They stop growing as a result of this signal of excessive cell touching. 

A cancer cell:

1. In cancer, the cells can reproduce quickly using mitosis as well but don’t have a chance to mature. Because they lack maturity, they don’t work properly. They never “understand”  their purpose. This rapid division also allows for a higher chance that they will transfer more mistakes in their genes (more mutations). They have uncontrolled growth – they want to come and go as they please without any consideration for any other cells that are present.
2. Chromosomes are their blueprint as well. It is carried in the DNA that holds that information for replication (RNA) to make more cells complete with the cancerous mistakes.  The cancer cells are instructed to make more cancer cells like it is “normal”.  
3. Cancer cells live much longer than normal cells, dividing and growing by altering the DNA. They don’t respond to the signal to die properly.)
4. Cancer cells are somewhat different in how they respond to their environment   (something like how people in stores act on “Black Friday” with too many super sales). Cancer does not care if it pushes or shoves others, and does not want or need to have a function or a place to live. The big thing is, they do not stop when they come in contact with a “normal” cell. This is part of the mutation “defect” (something interfered with normal cell programming when it was created) – this creates a tumor. Tumors appear in normal tissue and serve no purpose. They can be benign or malignant – malignant are the bad ones. 

Spontaneous cell mutations do not occur that often. Think about the skin cells being replaced. Constantly, old cells are removed and new ones are being made to replace the old ones – that is an astounding number of cells. However, that being said, it depends on your exposure to cancer-causing agents. Prolonged unprotected sun exposure, for example, can lead to several cell mutations. We have all heard of or maybe even had some form of skin cancer. There is a reason that we see so many cancer deaths worldwide and my guess is we do not need to look too far to find the potential sources.  

To recap: Cell defects can take several forms but most cancers share common mutations. We said that they grow much faster than regular cells. They do not die like regular cells– they are not recognized like normal cells and then programmed to die when their purpose or life span of a normal cell is completed. They also can disguise themselves as healthy cells and hide from the immune system. Cancer reproduces and mutates quickly to survive.  

Because cancer cells need nutrients and oxygen, they live near or grow a blood supply. Unlike normal cells, a piece of the tumor can break off and enter into the bloodstream. It can then travel in your blood vessels until it finds another home (liver, lung, kidney, brain, bone marrow, you name it) and like squatters – it takes up a new residence – building a completely new tumor. This process of cancer traveling in the body is called “Metastatic” cancer. These cancer cells do not contribute to the function of any of the organs where they live. If they are in the bone marrow; they do not contribute to making red or white blood cells, and do not make platelets.  And they can cause pain as they excessively grow in this relatively small enclosed space.

My father-in-law suffered from (unknown) metastatic lung cancer. He was very short of breath with any physical activity and simply attributed that to his decades of heavy smoking and COPD. One day, he began complaining of severe lower back pain and went to his chiropractor for relief. It was not until they did some x-rays that they were aware that he had (lung) cancer that had already spread to the bone marrow in his back and started to grow uncontrollably, causing severe back pain at the base of his spine.  

I had a doctor years ago, try to explain to a patient what metastatic cancer was and why a different drug would not be effective in treating her. He told her that she had breast cancer. She acknowledged it. Now the breast cancer was in her bones. She acknowledged that as well. Then he said, ”If you had kittens in your oven and moved them into the living room, wouldn’t they still be kittens?”. I think she finally understood that the kittens, no matter where they started, would always be kittens no matter where they traveled.  

Currently, it has been reported that metastatic cancer cells might respond to a chemotherapy treatment differently than how the initial primary tumors had responded. If they mutated again, they might not respond the same. So there is hope even in metastatic cancer. 

Cancer cells want to grow and that will demand a lot of energy to reproduce other cancer cells. They want all the nutrients they can get. The cancer cell must build all the components of the new cell at a very fast pace (think of a cancer cell as a city with its needs for housing, manufacturing, energy, roadways and so on). They do this through something called “metabolic reprogramming”. It is a process where it can alter its metabolism to support increased energy needs due to the need to feed the increased growth of cancer and to spread anywhere it can.  

This is where cancer cells and normal cells differ.  

All cells in the body require energy which is derived from our consuming carbohydrates (glucose), protein and fats.  From this we get something called ATP – the energy used by the cell to make other stuff.  

The process of converting what we eat to ATP is called “catabolism” (the breakdown of larger molecules to get smaller ones). There are a lot of steps in the process, but the end product is energy that our body can use. 

Glucose and oxygen are broken down to ultimately give us energy.  With a cancer cell, the glucose does not enter the normal cycle, it does not use oxygen but instead uses fermentation, and in the end, creates energy.  But not as efficiently as a normal cell, it is a fermentation process almost like beer or winemaking.  However, where there is a will, there is a way, and cancer will try to find a way.

The important point is that throughout the process the healthy cell just needs to make just enough energy to use to rebuild, function normally and provide you with the energy you need for activities of normal living.  

Cancer cells have a few fundamental differences in how they do business. For cancer cells to sustain their rapid uncontrolled growth, they have had to adapt. They obtain energy from outside the normal method. Cancer cells were noted to do this over 100 years ago by Otto Warburg (The Warburg Effect). That was the first biochemical marker for cancer cells. Cancer cells love sugar for the most part, however, cancer cells can also take up and process glutamine (via the breakdown of protein). 

This understanding of cancer cells and affinity for glucose (sugar) came to be developed into the modern-day PET scan that uses a radioactive substance with glucose to visualize the cancer. Now we have the PET/CT. The PET “sees” (because the cancer cell is now radioactive) the cancer, however, the depth and exact position are not known until you merge it with the CT scan to see exactly “where” it is. This is information for when you want to ask “Why do I need both?” 

I think that it is important to reinforce that not all cancers are created equal, what is good for growing conditions of one form of cancer may not be good for another form of cancer. What is a good treatment of one form of cancer may not be good for the treatment of another form.

Cancer is “opportunistic” in nature. It simply takes what it needs to continue to grow. There is no quick fix to cancer at this present time, although there are options to explore. 

One thing that has been suggested, and I have seen in many research studies recently, is to reduce the amount of glucose available as a possible resource to help control tumor growth. Studies show that glucose (carbohydrates) is one of the most available sources in our diet for energy. 

Cancer has an altered metabolism and can consume 200 times more sugar than normal cells. High glucose levels (especially with insulin resistance) seem to cause an environment for the production of cancer cells. High glucose then signals cells to multiply, the excess cells do not die, and they can have resistance to chemotherapy. In a high glucose environment, there is something called a “pro-inflammatory (swelling) environment” which might stimulate a response and promote more cell growth. In part, sugar is the elephant in the room.    

By now you are asking what the point of all this is. It is believed that diet (including intermittent fasting), exercise and especially weight loss have a huge impact, as an adjunct or addition to standard cancer treatment and on your response to the treatment. 

Lots more to come and I want to thank everyone for staying with me. Cancer is truly scary as are many other diseases such as; all autoimmune diseases however it is within your control to take the first steps to wellness and make surviving disease a reality for you.