From 1990 to 2003, Dr. VanArsdall practiced dentistry with her father in Carlisle Kentucky. In 2003, she became a full time faculty member at the University of Kentucky College of Medicine teaching anatomy to medical, dental and nursing students. In 2009, she became full time faculty in the College of Dentistry eventually becoming a Professor and Academic Dean.
VIDEO - DUwHF #1239 - Pam VanArsdall
AUDIO - DUwHF #1239 - Pam VanArsdall
In 2016, she stepped away from academics. She moved in with her mom and dad and took care of her father while he was dying of cancer. This was a pivotal point in her life. After he died, she was determined to find ways to avoid cancer. Pam has a Masters in Public Health and she already knew to avoid tobacco and to not drink excessively but she wanted to see if scientific evidence could offer anything more. She used the research skills she learned as a professor and dug into the research on ways to prevent cancer from lifestyle, and she found an avalanche of information on foods that fight cancer. It is now her passion to share this information with others. This has led her to become a certified health coach through the Wellcoaches School of Coaching, to become certified in Professional Plant Based Culinary Arts and to begin speaking at events and conferences on what she has learned about "Foods that Fight Cancer."
Howard: It's just a huge honor to be podcast interviewing Pam VanArsdall, from 1990 to 2003 she practiced dentistry with her father in Carlisle Kentucky in 2003 became a full-time faculty member at the University of Kentucky College of Medicine teaching anatomy to medical dental and nursing students. In 2009 she became full time faculty in the College of Dentistry eventually becoming a professor and academic dean. In 2016 she stepped away from after academics moved in with her mom and dad and took care of her father while he was dying of cancer this was a pivotal point in her life she never wants anyone else she loves to die from cancer and she never wants to go through this alone. After he died she was determined to find ways to avoid cancer she has a master's in public health and already knew to avoid tobacco and to not drink excessively but wanted to see if scientific evidence could offer anything more. She used the research skills she learned as a professor and dug into the research on ways to prevent cancer from lifestyle and she found an avalanche of information on foods that fight cancer. It is now our passion to share the information with others and this has led to become a certified health coach through the well coaches school of coaching to become certified in professional plant-based culinary arts and to begin speaking at events and conferences like today at the Kentucky Dental Association meeting about foods that fight cancer and you said the primary food that you eat is the Big Mac and the whopper with cheese did I hear that right?
Pam: Maybe 20 years
Howard: Maybe 20 years ago, so what do you so how much you think is our diet related to our diseases?
Pam: Well some some studies show in terms of cancer about 30% about 30% of cancers can be prevented by dietary changes up to 50 the 70% could be prevented by lifestyle changes so things like not only eating but getting the right amount of sleep exercise maintaining a good weight managing stress those kinds of things.
Howard: So what are you lecturing on here at the Kentucky Dental Association?
Pam: Well I have spent the last three years really digging into the research to see what I could find about lifestyle interventions to prevent cancer so I'll start by talking a little bit about the wealth of information I found about that I already knew lifestyle was important because of my master's in public health but I had no idea how important it was and that there's there's a whole branch of medicine lifestyle notes and now that's really developing around these core lifestyle preventive mechanisms and there's a lot of research that is very compelling not only for prevention but also for reversal of chronic diseases and so I'm gonna start by talking about that and then we're gonna hone in on diet and talk about diet and we're also gonna hone in on cancer because obviously with my background with my dad dying from cancer I had other family members died from cancer I'm very very interested in that particular chronic disease and and foods I mean foods seem I've always loved to cook and it just seems like an easy thing to modify and so we will get into the particular food types that have been shown really the superstars in terms of what the research shows may be preventive for cancer and sometimes actually these foods have been shown to work alongside traditional treatments like radiation and chemo and enhance the value of those or their effect so that's kind of be the basis of our talk today.
Howard: So what could you share with us about that talk yeah that sounds like an all-day talk.
Pam: Well I could be in all week talks yeah there's all kinds of information I could share.
Howard: What are the main points that dentists should be thinking about?
Pam: I think what I really want to communicate is cancer strikes such fear when we hear that word and we think oh gosh if I ever got a cancer diagnosis I would just be terrified but my message today is one of hope it's still scary for me to think about that I feel much more empowered now to do something if I were to get that diagnosis and I think I know now some of the specific foods that I would eat foods we know have vitamins and minerals and things like that in them but there are phytochemicals in foods phyto means plant so these are plant chemicals. So basically we're taught we're talking about plants here we're talking about fruits vegetables nuts and seeds and whole grains those are really the categories of foods and then some teas, green tea but phytochemicals are just chemicals and plants that do a whole host of things for us many of them are antioxidants which help protect ourselves from getting mutations in the first place and becoming cancer cells so that would be preventive but if we do have things that go awry with ourselves there are foods that help prevent proliferation or growth spread metastasis of those in a variety of mechanisms we're going to talk about those today one of the ways is by preventing angiogenesis, angiogenesis is the formation of blood vessels around the little tumors so a tiny tumor really can't grow and spread until it develops its own network of nourishment which would be blood vessels and so if we can cut off the blood supply before the cancer draws in the network of blood vessels around it that could be very preventive in terms of spread and grow there's a whole class of anti-angiogenic drugs developed to just do that in cancer therapy and we now know there are foods that have anti-angiogenic properties some of those foods are soy lots of herbs certain types of apples tomatoes flaxseed walnuts all kinds of fruits and vegetables blueberries tumeric I could go on and on so.
Howard: I remember reading one study where the surgeons would run a little tube down to the main artery of the tumor and squirt out a drop of superglue just to clog it then they were one day because it take a day for them to read and do that but in that one day that the tumor would shrink so that when they went in there surgically they'd have more defined borders so that blood supply is very important very important.
Pam: Right and there have been some studies that show autopsy studies that show women between 40 and 50 about 40% of them had breast cancers the tiny tumors they never knew about so cancer without disease and the same for men men between 50 and 60 who had were in these up autopsy studies about 50% of them had prostate tumors they didn't know about so I'm in my 50s and if I have a about a 40% chance that I have a tiny tumor somewhere you better believe I'm very interested in figuring out foods that I can consume they're gonna block the blood supply to that potentially.
Howard: Your the second woman today that gave we're age it's such a taboo subject and their and you both were blond dentists so the only two women I've ever had on this show I gave away their age were two blonde dentists in her 50s. Why was that not taboo for you to say that you're in your fifties?
Pam: Well gosh I think being in my 50s is kind I'm kind of proud of that I've got a lot of experience behind me and a lot of you know life has not always been very easy and I feel like I'm just a much stronger and wiser person so I'm happy to be in my 50s.
Howard: It sounds like your watching your father die this was a was a turning point that was that a rock-bottom something for you that is that what's driving a lot of this?
Pam: Yes it's what's driving a lot of this because okay I'm gonna give another taboo thing away I kind of sort of like to be in control and so I guess one of the ways I coped with that was trying to figure out okay I don't want this to happen to anybody else me included I deeply love my family my friends how am I gonna control this and so you know I just have a love of learning I was taught at the University for many years I knew how to do research I conducted research I published papers I had a great relationship with the medical school librarian who had been there for decades and so that's it made it gave me some purpose and some way to help me cope with the situation and also to do something not honor my father he was a dentist as well we practiced together for many years and in fact at the beginning of my presentation I show a slide of my dad and I here at the KDA many years ago.
Howard: What was his name?
Pam: His name was Bob Sparks
Howard: Bob Sparks wow
Pam: He's probably not on LinkedIn or anything like that he's probably not on the computer, I would say he was in his 80s when he passed away.
Howard: Still a good long life though because the average male lives to be 74.
Pam: Right but he was not your average bird I mean he worked out every morning at the Y he did all the things that the American Institute of cancer research says to do except maybe eating the way they say it was very active, he was very involved socially he didn't smoke he didn't drink he had I don't know he was doing it all right.
Howard: So but you started beginning of that and you thought 30% was related to?
Pam: Diet right
Howard: Cancer what mortality or getting cancer?
Pam: 30% of cancers could be prevented through change and diet
Howard: Wow that's huge
Pam: That is huge but if we had a drug that would do that why wouldn't we be doing that.
Howard: So in a nutshell is it fair to say that we eat too much processed food and on that plant?
Pam: Right exactly and so I think we now know that process meets the World Health Organization has classified them as a group 1 carcinogen which means they are a known percentage and cancer-causing so things like and I hate to say this because I made bacon for breakfast every morning for my children bacon sausage ham lunch meat hotdogs things like that pepperoni you know things like that we know now that those things are not only bad for you but they're actually carcinogenic we know that red meat it's a group two carcinogen so there is probable cause to believe that it's linked to cancer.
Howard: So in the dental office i'm sure everyone's you just got done doing a molar root canal it's almost like you fall out of the time zone and you're done and it's just natural to want it like stretch and go back to the break room and nibble on something and you open the refrigerator it's always cakes and cookies and donuts or whatever what what could a dental office do to be more proactive?
Pam: I think that's a great question and that's one of the reasons I became certified as a plant-based chef and also I have gotten into health coaching because I think there are some really simple small steps that can make a big difference we have a big bowl of fruit now and vegetables plants as you mentioned before fruits vegetables nuts seeds whole grains without those are the foods not only are they high in fiber but they have those very important anticancer phytochemicals so if you can have fresh fruits and vegetables around a bowl of granny smith apples granny smith apples are anti-angiogenic grapes angiogenic anti-angiogenic anti prevent the blood flow to the tumors walnuts walnuts function against cancer in about five or six different ways raw walnuts are a huge snack food in our family hummus and raw vegetables in the refrigerator that's another great idea.
Howard: You said granny apples
Pam: Granny Smith those are green tart ones granny smith apples or the Red Delicious apples, those are the two that have been shown to be very the most anti-angiogenic of all.
Howard: Granny smith green or what?
Pam: Granny smith green apples or Red Delicious.
Howard: Red delicious and then your the other one you said was a hummus and
Pam: Hummus is made with chickpeas so that and it also has garlic in it and garlic is a is one of the top anti-cancer foods according to research.
Howard: and what would you eat with hummus?
Pam: Raw veggies so broccoli would be fantastic broccoli is a member of the cruciferous family and the cruciferous family is probably the group of plants that have the most cancer fighting ability of all groups of vegetables and broccoli is so cruciferous family is a superstar in families of vegetables and in the cruciferous family broccoli is the superstar
Howard: and broccoli that's in the same one as I am I remember the tree it's like broccoli cauliflower a mustard greens...
Pam: Oh you're doing great yeah radishes kale, kale is actually his headless cabbage so the cruciferous family is the cabbage family basic or sometimes called the Brassica family radishes, turnips, mustard greens, rutabaga, bok choy, watercress, brussel sprouts.
Howard: A lot of it is just what's convenient
Pam: Yeah
Howard: I mean I guess I noticed like when my grandkids come over if there's healthy stuff right there they just grab it and if there's unhealthy stuff right there I mean if you put Lunchables there though they'll grab that I mean the so a lot of that's just the easiest fastest thing to eat is what most people...
Pam: but I think an apple is pretty easy to eat and so are nuts and so just you know making changes about your shopping so it's not readily available it's big so what you have in your home is healthy and so it's not easy to grab Snickers or a bag of chips you know you could grab a bag of dried apple chips if you like something crunchy and you don't want to eat...
Howard: So you were talking about a processed meats you know you bacon your hot dogs or all that kind of stuff what about just animals in general I mean cows fish chickens.
Pam: There's so much controversy around that I personally have adopted a whole food plant-based diet I very little meat epidemiological studies show that populations that a little meat maybe some fish but very little meat like chicken and you know the kinds of things we eat mostly in America live the longest some have been healthiest lives and then they're just been some concerning studies around things like chicken and prostate cancer and even milk and prostate cancer so I am NOT here to tell everyone they have to become a vegan, what I want to encourage them to do is to eat more plants but I do think there is some research that might suggest less meat is better.
Howard: Some researcher a lot of research?
Pam: I think there's quite a bit of research actually yeah I just came back from the International Conference on nutrition in medicine and I went to that last year as well it's fantastic in Washington DC I go with to that with a physician friend of mine and it's lecture after lecture after lecture after lecture from scientists who are the experts in the world in their field and we just hear this again and again and again and in fact in 1982 the natural National Academy of Science put out an executive summary on diet cancer it's the first report ever like that in the United States they had six recommendations one of those was to eat more plants which was just kind of my mantra but another was about dairy and about meat and they've got so much pushback from the different interest groups that there was just a lot of commotion about that and you know at that point there was...
Howard: What do you mean like from
Pam: The industry
Howard: Right but I mean was the pushback just verbal or was it more even beyond verbal?
Pam: I'm not certain
Howard: because I remember right here in Kentucky we'll bring it right on the Kentucky I remember back in the day a guy on dental town published a report showing that smokeless tobacco I mean they're they're banned tobacco but that smokeless tobacco was far better than smoke smoking and he compared cigarettes to chewing tobacco and he said that and he showed that chewing tobacco was so much better for you than smoking number one you don't have all this smoke one long sir he was fired he was fired that's how much pressure was put on him, do you remember that one and then in Arizona a friend of mine a lady from Tucson published a piece of research about something going on on Indian reservations she was fired I mean there's I'm so I'm Oprah Winfrey said something about cows...
Pam: Yeah
Howard: She had to truck her way all the way to a courthouse in Texas so.
Pam: You know I'm not certain exactly went on but I know that there was some problems after that was published and at that time we didn't know we did not have the World Health Organization had not said that processed meats are carcinogenic and what they said then was let's invoke the precautionary principle this was in 1982 why wait like we did with smoking you know if we had told people it really looks like this is going to cause lung cancer but we so don't smoke don't wait until it's 100% sure until you start making some changes because if you make changes towards a healthier diet and more fruits and vegetables and less meat that's only going to help you its side effects are less strokes less heart attacks you know things like that better exercise.
Howard: Well I remember that Mayo Clinic book was written by the MD PhD the k-factor where he said that were Mayo Clinic's a word and they took people high blood pressure and change their diet to less than one gram of sodium a day is like 92 percent of the people did not need their medication but you eat one hotdog I mean they say the average American eats eight grams of sodium a day and they need one gram.
Pam: Well and and look at the ingredient list I mean I encourage people to look at the ingredient list you're probably not going to know half of what's on there and oftentimes sugar is the first ingredient or the second and they're listed and the order in which you know their contents so we need to be looking at our labels we need to be thinking about that.
Howard: Actually I always heard that if the food has a label you should read it and everything you should be eating doesn't have a label.
Pam: I like the way you're talking you need a whole food plant-based diet you're not eating food with labels I'm mean green tea has a label that says organic green tea.
Howard: So the pushback is probably they just think I could never give up my cinnamon bun rolls or hummus and how do you go about that?
Pam: I would say make a small change make a small change I have a tremendous sweet tooth I come from a family that loves donuts like you wouldn't believe drive I don't know 60 miles to get a donut right and I mean I chief among them I love my sweets but after my dad died I started tapering down and your palate changes and now when I eat a doughnut it's like oh my gosh it's so sweet it's still good don't get me wrong but then I feel so bad not bad guilty but physically I've cleaned my diet up so much but this has happened over three years and I started with just tapering the amount of sugar a little bit a little bit less a little bit less and including more you know happened making the changes about what I buy at the grocery so I don't have it at the ready if it's not there I don't eat it.
Howard: So talk about what AZ a certified health coach through the well coaches school of coaching and by the way I wish you would make an online CE course on getting ten and we've made 400 courses they've been views almost a million times.
Pam: Oh I would love to do that.
Howard: because so many people coming to a convention they got a Mis world travel they like to watch it on their iPad sure but I would love to have them what's the title of your..
Pam: Evidence that suggest foods that fight cancer
Howard: So what is this um well coaches school of coaching to become certified professional plant-based culinary arts?
Pam: Well those are two different things okay I have the health coaching certification and then I have the culinary arts certification so those are two different training programs and certification processes and one is to become a plant-based chef and to learn I learned the way I was raised and the way I cooked for the first 40 years of my life 45, 50 was meat potato bread and in a small corner of the plate there might be a vegetable.
Howard: Covered in cheese
Pam: or maybe mac and cheese
Howard: It was always made with broccoli but it was in a bowl of cheese
Pam: Exactly so yeah I had to once I realized the importance of plants and I started to see this new plate the new plate guidelines is that the protein is that small corner and that the rest of it is the colors of the rainbow with all these plants your nuts and seeds and fruits and vegetables so I knew I mean I had to get some education around this so that's why I went to school to learn the plant-based culinary arts and there was a there was actually a medical director so it was all about health so that was very helpful.
Howard: So I've noticed out in Phoenix there's a the restaurants have a high mortality rate 20 to 40 percent go to businesses the first two years and their profits are you almost none except for the vegan restaurants and those guys are running 50 percent profit margins it's expensive and you go in there and like all over like spaghetti but the noodles are all plant and and there it's it's times a vegan and the dinners are expensive the places are packed it's like if I knew what you know I would have a restaurant because that the person who says well I want to do that that I'm lazy and I still want to go out to eat and you know you're gonna go to steak house or in Phoenix are you gonna go to the pomegranate cafe and you can order anything you want to on the menu and it's vegan and you would just almost never know but it's tasty and then it's funny because you realize that if you'd have gone to your traditional Mexican Italian or steakhouse when you're done you go slip into a food coma and when you go either vegan dinner when you're done you go back home and you're still energized
Pam: Right
Howard: So what is that food coma I mean people you say anything oh it's the tryptophan in the turkey is it bad.
Pam: and I think part of it part of it might be the additives in the food the heaviness of the food the saturated fat which makes your blood thick and then sugar I mean I have a friend who is a school teacher and she was very concerned about the foods that our kids are getting the free breakfast in the school system things like pop-tarts and chocolate chocolate chip muffins and french toast sticks with syrup and an hour and a half later those kids are there in a food coma they have crashed. Now that's not right, it's not right.
Howard: Talking about pushback it was so hard just to get that Coke machines out of the schools I mean and I mean we were both born in this country I'm sure we both love our country but sometimes you feel like this is about truth, liberty and justice or money's the answer what's the question.
Pam: I don't know and I try I try not to get bogged down in that because it's it upsets me I mean I have read some books that are along those lines and one of them was called the unhealthy truth which is a really good read but was eye-opening in a way that was a bit discouraging so I what I try to focus on is what I can do and again this is the control person in me what can I change I can't change that what I can change is what I'm doing and hopefully in my little corner of the world I can encourage people to make small changes that eventually will result in big ones.
Howard: Yeah well what really concerns me is that when you go into any of these grocery stores I think like I got like a Kroger or Walmart there's about 60,000 SKU items and 40,000 we come from 8 companies so basically America eats everything processed from no it's nine companies I mean you know the big the big nine and they're about profit they're not about its money's answer what's the question so it just comes down to going back to learning how to cook
Pam: and shop and shopping in there I mean the most of your time should be spent in that produce section.
Howard: I remember one time and it's all I had to like I said to myself I said well it's just so instant to hit fast food I mean instead of you know making a lunch and packaging it they go packaging it and orange the Apple already comes ready you throw it in your car seat.
Pam: and there are some ways on the way up here I didn't have a lot of time I drove in from Lexington but I stopped it up in there and I got a green smoothie which had ice spinach and mango it was delicious and extremely sweet so I think probably even a kid would love that and I had a whole green bagel with some seeds and I have a banana and that was plenty for me at least I eat more often I can't eat a lot at one time and so that was completely filling to me and that was fast food that was through a drive-through.
Howard: You know our generation was you know so say an hour radio that we have commercials and then be six three-minute songs so you had all these artists that sold 10 to 50 million Oh Elvis Presley the Beatles now all these big stars and then the Millennials got a cell phone where they can download a thousand songs and ever since that happened nobody sells 10 million units it's what they call the long tail and I'm already starting to see that like our generation all the like cheese was like American cheese Velveeta cheese the Millennials it's a long tale they like a thousand different kinds so that the mass market is being replaced by the longtail and I think those instead of having these mass chain restaurants we're gonna start seeing a long tail like where I eat a home of pomegranate cafe they were it's a mother and her daughter and they buy all the produce local and it's all vegan and I don't everyone tell anybody I like being a vegan because when you go eat they're vegan you wouldn't even know it but and definitely changes thank you so much for doing what you're doing lecturing on what you're lecturing on I think what you're doing is so important I hope someday you make us an online CE course on dentaltown
Pam: I would love to do that.
Howard: because this is a changes tough and we got we got to go from a fast food industry from big Wall Street trading companies with 40,000 locations and these little picking ourselves again having a home garden.
Pam: Yeah we've gone from fast food to slow food.
Howard: Yeah and when I was little that when I came home with school the first thing I always want to check in Kansas was my tomatoes and then your cucumbers and you waited all year for the that I remember I you saw my pumpkins I'd pick off every bloom except one I wanted the whole route to go into build the one big bad pumpkin you know and and now I feel like these little kids here they don't even know when fruits are in season is a year-round so they're used to having everything that I mean when we were little we knew when the strawberry season the tomatoes I mean and we would look forward to that like you would look forward to Easter and Christmas and New Year's and
Pam: Because the food is so darn good start out of the garden.
Howard: Yeah my mom use to always tease so when to build a fire in the inner garden and boil the water and then lean the corn from what was still on the stock into the pot that was there she never did it but that was a joke thank you so much for letting me podcast you
Pam: Thank you very much, it was a pleasure.
Howard: and again I hope you make out online course this on Dentaltown this information needs to get out even more.
Pam: I would love too.
Howard: All right we'll have a great day
Pam: Thanks