Impacto da suplementação com Agaricus sobre o número de células “Natural Killer” como uma terapia adjuvante para pacientes com câncer em tratamento quimioterápico

Abstract

Cancer is currently responsible for 13% of the worldwide deaths and researches on alternative treatments have drawn attention. During the development of malignant neoplasm, immunosuppression can be aggravated or affected by disease itself, or by aggressive sorts of treatment, such as chemotherapy. A medicinal mushroom that has aroused the interest of researchers is of Brazilian origin and once it has several synonyms (as Agaricus blazei and Agarius sylvaticus) is referred in this article as Agaricus. Objectifying to analyze the behavior of the immunologic system of cancer patients being treated with chemotherapy and the effect of dietary supplementation with Agaricus, were verified the records of voluntary outpatients diagnosed with cancer and indications for chemotherapy, followed in a particular clinical oncology, and conducted a quantitative analysis of the records of NK cell count. We involved 36 cancer patients with chemotherapy indication. From these, 11 patients from the control group were submitted to chemotherapy, and 10 of them (90.9%) presented significative reduction of NK cell-number (P=0.005); 15 patients were submitted to pretreatment with Agaricus, and 10 (66.7%) presented significative improvement of NK cell-number (P=0.004); 10 patients started supplementation after chemotherapy had started, and 8 (80.0%) presented improvement of NK cell-number (P=0.027). The 11 control group patients opted to adhere to the supplementation after NK cell-count during chemotherapy, and 100% of them showed a raise in NK cell-number (P=0.001). Evidence strongly suggests that Agaricus supplementation causes a significant raise in the number of NK cells in cancer patients submitted to chemotherapy, and we believe this nutritional therapy can give support to cancer treatments, by providing immunopotentiation.