Experts warn against using soursop fruit to fight cancer

o Our fruit, with its sweet pulp and distinctive flavour, is grown commercially to make juices, desserts, sorbets and ice cream.

It’s also supposed to have medicinal qualities, with claims online that soursop extract can slow the spread of cancer or make traditional cancer treatments work better.

Experts warn against using the fruit to treat cancer. While research suggests that soursop may fight cancer, it has not been studied in humans. As a result, there is no evidence of its safety or effectiveness.

Soursop has been linked to many unsubstantiated claims, says Daniel Kellman, ND, FABNO, clinical director of naturopathic medicine at our hospital outside Atlanta.

Guanabanas and paw claws

The tall, spiny fruit comes from the graviola tree, an evergreen tree native to Mexico, the Caribbean, and Central and South America. It is also known as custard apple, soursop, and Brazilian foot stem. Practitioners of herbal medicine use soursop and the leaves of the graviola tree to treat stomach ailments, fever, parasitic infections, high blood pressure, and rheumatism. It is also used as a sedative.

But the claims about the fruit’s anti-cancer properties have attracted the most attention. A study published in the Journal of Medicinal Chemistry in 1997 suggested that soursop compounds tested on cultured breast cancer cells were more effective than chemotherapy at killing the cells. But without clinical trials, there is no data to support this claim.

Links to other disorders

The most studied are fatty acid derivatives of soursop called immature acetogenin. The predominant acetogenin is ananocin, which, due to its toxicity, will likely not be studied in clinical trials.

When used orally, soursop is rated as potentially unsafe, Kellman said, citing two studies. Eating the fruit can lead to movement disorders similar to Parkinson’s disease, according to a case-control study in the French West Indies. Additionally, one study reports that tea made from the leaves and stems of graviola is associated with neurotoxicity.

In general, some cancer patients use herbal supplements to relieve their symptoms and treat their cancer. However, herbal supplements are not a substitute for traditional cancer care. Additionally, the use of herbal supplements during chemotherapy may reduce the effectiveness of chemotherapeutic agents due to potential interactions between herbs and medications.