In honor of Breast Cancer Awareness month, we all needed to discuss a few accessible and approachable methods that may lessen your chance of cancer. Prostate cancer is the second most frequent cancer among men in America following skin cancer treatment, so odds are you or somebody you know is impacted by this ailment:
Exercise often: Make exercise a priority and find time to receive busy 3-4 days every week. Whether you would like to walk, play tennis, run with a buddy, or dance for one hour at Zumba, only get going! In reality, as few as 1 hour and 15 minutes into two 1/2 hours of brisk walking per week was demonstrated to lessen your risk by 18 percent. Eat clean and limit processed foods: By eating a diet full of whole foods and legumes with no antibiotics and additional hormones, it’s possible to help slash your probability of cancer. When all-natural, salty beef is outside your budget, consider integrating alternative protein sources such as legumes, nuts, or milk into your daily diet.
Of course, having exposure to risk factors like a family history of cancer or choosing to smoke or drink often can increase your chances of developing cancer. Cut out those vices and free yourself to have the best chances of fending off cancer. Cancer is a horrible disease that has taken so many lives and will continue to in the future. The good news is that our choices can have a fundamental difference in whether or not we may develop this terrible affliction. So fight back and make those healthy choices!
Our recommendations for reducing the risk of breast cancer
Unfortunately, a healthy lifestyle alone is not enough to guarantee that we will not develop cancer. The causes of cancer are too complex and vary significantly from individual to individual. However, with these recommendations, you can at least reduce your risk and also increase your general well-being:
Get plenty of exercise, be physically active in your daily life and do regular
exercise.
Ensure you eat a fiber-rich diet, e.g., cereals, legumes, brown rice, wholemeal pasta, and wholemeal bread. In addition, eat plenty of fruits and vegetables, preferably raw and unpeeled. If you don’t tolerate natural foods, then also like them lightly cooked and still firm to the bite.
The cells in the breast have so-called receptors that can bind hormones (e.g., estrogens) to them. In this way, “messages” mediated by hormones reach the cell. Among other things, this stimulates the growth of glandular cells in the breast during puberty or pregnancy. Unfortunately, estrogens can also promote the development and proliferation of some cancer cells via these receptors. This is particularly true of preparations for menopausal symptoms (“hormone replacement therapy”).
Hormone replacement therapy increases the risk of breast cancer if it is taken for longer than five years, especially with preparations containing both estrogen and progestin. However, when hormones are stopped, the risk returns to average levels within a few years.
Unhealthy lifestyle
Smoking is the most important preventable risk factor for cancer – this applies to lung cancer and many other types of cancer, including breast cancer. In particular, when girls start smoking in their teens, their risk of breast cancer increases significantly. Therefore, the alarming increase in lung cancer in women should be a reason not to smoke at any age.
Diet also plays a role in quantity and composition: overweight women are more likely to get breast cancer than slim women because hormones formed in fatty tissue cause estrogen levels to rise. And the fat in the food also plays a role: those who eat a lot of animal fats (fatty sausage and fatty meat, whole milk products, butter, lard) also have higher estrogen levels and thus somewhat higher risk. This explains, among other things, the much lower incidence of breast cancer in Asian countries, where traditionally few animal fats are eaten. However, due to increasing adaptation to Western habits, the risk of breast cancer is now also rising in Asia.
The density of the mammary gland
Women with a high so-called mammographic density – that is, with less fat and more glandular and connective tissue – have a fivefold increased risk of developing breast cancer. By comparison, women with a first-degree relative with breast cancer have a twofold increased risk.
Breast density can be determined from mammogram images and is divided into four different density grades depending on the ratio of denser connective and glandular tissue to less dense fatty tissue: :
– Density grade I: fat-transparent, well-transparent,
– Density grade II: moderately transparent,
– Density grade III: dense,
– Density grade IV: extremely dense.