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How to Lower Your Breast Cancer Risk

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Exercise can help lower a woman’s risk of developing breast cancerWe’ve known for some time that exercise can help lower a woman’s risk of developing breast cancer, and now a large new study suggests that the more a woman exercises, the lower her risk, whether she’s overweight or not. The study comes from the American Cancer Society’s Epidemiology Research Program, which had compiled data on more than 73,600 women ages 50 to 73. These women enrolled in the study in the early 1990s and submitted follow-up questionnaires every two years until 2009. The questionnaires delved into the details of what the participants did during their leisure time and how they exercised. Only nine percent reported never exercising. Overall, most of the women listed walking at a pace of three miles per hour as their usual mode of exercise, but some reported more strenuous activity including running, swimming or singles tennis. The researchers found that walking at least seven hours per week (typically once a day) reduced breast cancer risk by 14 percent compared to women who walked less than three hours per week. The most active women, who worked up a sweat while working out for up to 10 hours a week, reduced their breast cancer risk by 25 percent compared to the women who did the least exercise.

My take? This study confirms the conclusions of previous investigations that demonstrated exercise lowered breast cancer risk regardless of a woman’s weight. A study from Germany published in 2008 showed exercise reduced breast cancer risk among women over 50 even more effectively than it did among women age 30 to 49. And a study published in 2003 found that women who don’t begin to exercise until later in life can still reduce their breast cancer risk by 20 percent. Here, a brisk, half-hour walk five times a week was enough to lower the risk, even among women with a strong family history of the disease, those who hadn’t had children (a long-recognized risk factor), and those who had taken hormone replacement therapy. It also found that 10 hours of exercise per week could cut risk by 30 percent.

Source:
Janet S. Hildebrand, et al, “Recreational Physical Activity and Leisure-Time Sitting in Relation to Postmenopausal Breast Cancer Risk,” Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention,  doi: 10.1158/1055-9965.EPI-13-0407

Karen Steindorf and Martina Schmidt et al, “Physical Activity and Postmenopausal Breast Cancer: Effect Modification by Breast Cancer Subtypes and Effective Periods in Life,” Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers and Prevention, December 2008

Anne McTiernan et al,  “Recreational Physical Activity and the Risk of Breast Cancer in Postmenopausal Women”, Journal of the American Medical Association, September 10, 2003

Dr Weil’s Daily Health Tips


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