What You Need To Know About Breast Cancer

What You Need to Know About Bre@st Cancer to Improve Your Odds

October is National Bre@st Cancer Awareness Month, so I'm focusingthis issue on some of the things that we know about bre@st cancer.

Are You At Risk?

Specific factors that can put you at risk for bre@st cancer include:

1. Having a close relative who has had bre@st cancer2. Having your first child in your thirties, or later3. Not having children4. Early menstrual cycles (before age twelve)5. Being African American6. Diet, as discussed below7. Antibiotic use - a new study found that antibiotic users hada 50% higher risk of bre@st cancer and the higher the use, thehigher the risk. Researchers believe that the antibioticuse was due to chronic inflammation, which was linked to cancerand heart disease.

Diet and weight are starting to appear as major risk factors forbre@st cancer. Here are some of the facts that we know aboutthe correlation of diet and weight with bre@st cancer.

* Obese women, in other words, those with a Body Mass Index of30 or more (calculate your BMI at http://nhlbisupport.com/bmi/),face two-to-four times the risk of bre@st cancer (and endometrialcancer). The fat found around the abdomen, in apple-shaped women,seems to be more reactive, leading to faster cell growth,including growth of cancerous cells.

* Research by the American Cancer Society shows that postmenopausalwomen who had gained 21-30 pounds over their weight at age 18were at a 40% greater risk of getting bre@st cancer than thosewho had only gained 5 pounds or less. It's thought that bre@stcancer risk increases due to the excess fat tissue increasingthe body's estrogen levels.

* A study of women in Mexico who consumed high-carbohydrate diets(especially high in corn products) found that they were twice aslikely to get bre@st cancer. Researchers theorize that thecarbohydrates raise blood sugar and provide an environmentfavorable for replication of cancer cells. Women in the study whoconsumed more fruits, vegetables, and whole grains, all of whichcontain insoluble fiber, had far less bre@st cancer risk, leadingto speculation that diets higher in insoluble fiber put women atless risk of bre@st cancer. American women typically consume dietsthat are much lower in carbohydrates than the women studied.

What about Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT)? Is it a risk factor?We don't really know. Until fairly recently, doctors prescribedHRT for protection against heart disease, colon cancer, andosteoporosis, especially if you had a family history of those.The downside was an increased risk of bre@st cancer. However,the US Women's Health Initiative studies found no protective effectfor the heart from HRT, and in the estrogen-only study there wasno bre@st cancer risk increase. However, scientists in Scandinaviacalled off their HRT study among women who had alreadyexperienced bre@st cancer due to the high risk of bre@st cancerrecurrence among study participants. We just don't know, butfor now, HRT may be OK for short-term symptom relief, butis not a long-term strategy.

Getting Checked Out

Talk with your doctor about whether you have a family historyof bre@st cancer. If you have had one, or more, female relative(s)with bre@st cancer, you need to be on a more frequent andaggressive screening program and you may even want to considergenetic testing for you and other family members.

How frequently to do mammograms is a subject of some debate,but here are some facts that may help.

* For women over age fifty, having a mammogram annually saveslives due to a 30% reduction in death rates from bre@st cancer.For women in their forties, the reduction is 16%-18%.
* The American Cancer Society and the National Cancer Instituterecommend starting to have mammograms at age 40, and to havethem every one–two years thereafter.
* Mammograms aren't as accurate for pre-menopausal women becausetheir bre@st tissue is denser, resulting in a higher rate of falsepositives. For example, 97% of women in their forties who underwentsurgical biopsies resulting from the findings on their mammogramsdidn't actually have bre@st cancer.

This year, October 15 is National Mammography Day, and throughoutthe month many facilities will give free or reduced-price mammograms.

Managing Your Risk

What are some things that you can do to manage your risk ofbre@st cancer?
* Get moderate levels of exercise (30-60 minutes per day), whichhas been shown to reduce bre@st cancer in post-menopausal women,and is good for all of us. (It reduces your risk of heart diseaseand stroke, too.)
* Control your weight and manage your diet. Focus on fruits,vegetables, and whole grains, to get insoluble fiber, and maintaina diet lower in fats and carbohydrates. A couple of specificfood examples include:
- Flavones, found in some fruits and vegetables, such as celery,lettuce, peppers, spinach, chili pepper, lemon, and parsley,protect against bre@st cancer; for each 0.5 gram per day consumed,bre@st cancer risk decreases by 13%.
- Lignins, found in ground flaxseed (a whole grain containing healthyOmega-3 fatty acids), appear to reduce the incidence of bre@stcancer.
* If you're on a statin drug (Lipitor, Zocor, Crestor, Pravachol,or others) for controlling your cholesterol, that appears to alsoreduce the risk of bre@st cancer (and colon cancer) by easinginflammation (as measured by a test called C-Reactive Protein).
Bottom line: Diet and exercise can reduce your risk of bre@stcancer. If you're dieting and exercising, but not losing weight,consider whether you're under a lot of stress. Stress can negatethe impact of diet and exercise, so managing that stress may helpyou lose that excess weight, and be the third pillar in yourstrategy to avoid bre@st cancer.


Mellanie True Hills (http://www.mellaniehills.com), the Health& Productivity Revitalizer, works with individuals andorganizations that want to be healthier and more productive.She is the author of 'A Woman's Guide to Saving Her Own Life:The HEART Program for Health & Longevity.' Read the first twochapters online athttp://www.mellaniehills.com/bookawgexcerpt.htm