I have a cousin who has pancreatic cancer. His friend suggested an old Polynesian remedy called "noni" juice. I have never heard of it. Also it is quite expensive at $45.00 for a quart size bottle. Please tell us what it is made of and is it safe to drink?

The fruit of the morinda plant is the base of noni juice. Proponents of noni juice claim that Polynesian and other Pacific Islanders have used the morinda fruit for centuries to cure cancer, multiple sclerosis, arthritis, and hypertension.

If this sounds too good to be true, it is. There is no scientific basis for the claims mentioned above. The "evidence" cited to support the use of noni juice are testimonials, often from people selling the juice. Due to lack of evidence confirming efficacy and the high cost of the juice, it may be in your cousin's best interest to save his/her money.

I have survived 3 cycles of chemotherapy, so far. My blood counts are low. Should I be taking iron supplements? What are good food sources of iron?

From what you describe, your blood counts appear to be low due to the cytotoxic effect of chemotherapy. If that is the case, iron supplementation may not be the answer. We have to be careful with iron supplementation because high doses can be toxic and cause liver and cardiac damage. Patients who receive multiple red blood cell transfusions are at an increased risk for excessive iron stores in tissues, therefore taking oral iron supplements is a contraindication. Iron supplementation should be discussed with your oncologist.

Although your low blood counts are probably not due to a dietary deficiency, for your information, here are good food sources of iron. There are two types of iron sources of food - meat (heme) sources and plant (non-heme) sources. The iron from the meat sources is more easily absorbed than the plant sources. Iron absorption can be increased with consuming foods high in Vitamin C (such as orange juice) in the same meal as the plant source of iron. Meat sources high in iron are pork, chicken, and beef liver, clams, oyster, shrimp, and beef. Plant sources high in iron are fortified cereals (hot and cold), spinach (cooked), sunflower seeds, cashews, and beans (kidney, refried, black beans).

What are isoflavones? What is it about soy and isoflavones that is so beneficial against breast cancer? If it is beneficial, what kinds of soy products do you recommend? I dislike tofu.

Isoflavones are plant chemicals that resemble the human hormone estrogen and are thousands of times weaker than human estrogen. The potentially good news for isoflavones and breast cancer prevention is that in certain animal studies, isoflavones appear to compete for attachments on cells and block the estrogen from stimulating the cells. These effects have yet to be proven conclusively in humans.

Although the results of soy and cancer risk are still inconclusive, soybeans are still good bet as a food source. Soy is a good alternate to meat because it is an excellent source of protein. It is high in fat (about 47 percent of soybeans' calories are from fat) but it is mostly unsaturated fat.

Soy products are not limited to tofu. You can try the actual soybean also known as "edamame." There are also a wide variety of soy products you can choose from such as soy milk (flavored or plain), soy yogurt, soy cheese, nondairy soy ice cream, soybean butter, and soy flour. Natural and health food stores tend to have the greatest variety of soyfoods. Asian food stores often carry most of the soyfoods used in East Asia. For more product information please refer to the U.S. Soyfoods Directory published by the Indiana Soybean Development Council at (800) TALKSOY.