Are All Women at Risk for Getting Breast Cancer?

Breast Cancer Risk

All women are at risk for getting breast cancer. As you get older, your risk increases. Assuming you live to age 90, your risk of getting breast cancer over your lifetime is about 12%. That might sound scary, because it means that an average of about 1 out of every 7 women will get breast cancer over a 90-year life span.


Lowering Breast Cancer Risk

A new study finds that breastfeeding significantly reduces the incidence of breast cancer among premenopausal women who have a family history of breast cancer, a factor that places them at especially high risk for the disease.

According to the American Cancer Society, women who have one first-degree relative (mother, daughter, sister) with breast cancer have about a twofold increased risk of getting the disease. The increased risk rises to fivefold for women who have two first-degree relatives with breast cancer.

The study evaluated information from 60,075 women who had participated in the second Harvard Nurses’ Health Study. Tamoxifen, which has been used for about thirty years to treat breast cancer and for about ten years as a preventive approach for women at high risk, is associated with several serious side effects, including blood clots, stroke, uterine cancer, and cataracts. For women, breastfeeding has been associated with a reduced risk of developing ovarian cancer, osteoporosis, high blood pressure, and heart disease. Breastfed infants generally have a lower risk of developing common infant problems, including diarrhea, bacterial meningitis, and ear infections.

The study’s researchers noted several curious findings from the study. One was that the reduction in breast cancer risk did not change among women who had breast-fed exclusively or for longer periods of time. Clearly there are many unanswered questions about the association between breastfeeding and breast cancer risk, and further research is needed.

The other research in China found The study, of more than 2,000 Chinese women, found that the more fresh and dried mushrooms the women ate, the lower was their breast cancer risk. The women who ate the most fresh mushrooms — 10 grams or more per day — were about two thirds less likely to develop breast cancer than non-consumers of mushrooms. Meanwhile, women who ate 4 grams or more of dried mushrooms per day had half the cancer risk of non-consumers.
Source : breastandbeauty