Putting off babies can raise breast cancer risk

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Putting off babies can raise breast cancer risk
Kashif
02/13/02 at 13:05:53
Putting off babies can raise breast cancer risk
By Nigel Hawkes, Health Editor

WOMEN who delay having children for the sake of their careers have a greater risk of developing breast cancer, a study has shown.
Scientists have also confirmed that the disease is more likely to occur in women who started their periods earlier. Having a miscarriage does not, however, increase the risk of breast cancer, the survey says in contradiction to earlier work.

Researchers tracked 91,000 French women aged 40 to 65 over ten years, sending them detailed questionnaires and recording whether or not they developed breast cancer. By the end of the decade, cancer had been diagnosed in 1,718 women, and the researchers compared their histories with those who had not developed it.

The findings are important because many women now delay giving birth to begin a career and there has also been a trend towards earlier menstruation.

These could be factors in the rise in the number of breast cancer cases, the study suggests.

Women who had their first child in their thirties were 63 per cent more likely to develop breast cancer before the menopause than those who gave birth before the age of 22. After the menopause, the extra risk was less, at 35 per cent.

In addition, for every year that menstruation was delayed, the risk of breast cancer before the menopause was reduced by 7 per cent. This result is significant because the age of menarche — when menstruation begins — has fallen by two years in the past century. There are now reports of girls as young as eight starting their periods.

The research also showed that miscarriage was not associated with an increased risk of breast cancer before or after the menopause.

Françoise Clavel-Chapelon of the Institut Gustave-Roussy in Villejuif, lead author of the study, which appears in the British Journal of Cancer, said: “This information will help us to understand the mechanisms by which breast cancer develops. It’s especially interesting that the influences on a woman’s risk of breast cancer can be so different before and after she reaches the menopause.”

Professor Gordon McVie, Joint Director-General of Cancer Research UK, said: “The link between reproductive factors, fluctuation in hormones and women’s breast cancer risk is extremely complex, and previous small-scale studies have often produced confusing and conflicting results. Only by looking at very large numbers of women, as this study has, can we start to build up a picture of how and why breast cancer develops.”

Professor McVie said the study would continue for the next ten years and would look at other possible factors, including the effect of hormone replacement therapy and other lifestyle factors such as diet.

Professor Robin Weiss of University College London, the editor of the British Journal of Cancer, said: “There is a one in nine chance of getting breast cancer for all women and those who don’t have children, or have them late, have a higher chance, whereas those who have lots young have a lower chance. These figures are highly significant, but remember, you are not certain to get breast cancer just because you haven’t had kids.”

http://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/0,,2-206859,00.html
NS
Re: Putting off babies can raise breast cancer risk
abc
02/14/02 at 03:19:08
Assalamu alaikum

[quote]WOMEN who delay having children for the sake of their careers have a greater risk of developing breast cancer[/quote]

...and women who don't have kids coz no decent guy has proposed till they're 30 aren't at risk?
Why do ppl assume that if a woman is not a mother, then it must be because of a career. Granted, in many cases it might be true but not all....there are lots of other reasons.

And I've heard that women who have children at early ages (teenage to early 20's) are at risk for cervical/uterine cancer. So is the choice between breast or cervical??
Re: Putting off babies can raise breast cancer risk
Barr
02/14/02 at 05:49:37
Assalamu'alaikum :-)

Hmm, interesting article. Thanx for putting that up, akhi.

I wonder whether this study looks at the correlation between breast feeding and susceptibility to breast cancer. I heard a study was done where breast feeding helps decrease chances of breast cancer. Allahua'lam.

So, it may be, that women are at lower risk of breast cancer due to breast feeding, rather than just mere having children (ceteris peribus).

So, technically, it doesn't really increase risk, if having children are delayed, but rather risked are minimised when women do bear children. Hmmm, do I make sense?

[quote]And I've heard that women who have children at early ages (teenage to early 20's) are at risk for cervical/uterine cancer. So is the choice between breast or cervical?? [/quote]

Moral of the story - Find a man when you're 25, marry at 26, have children at 27 plus you have an extra 2 years to maneuvre for any unforseeable circumstances and technical problems before you hit 30. ;-D

( Haiii...Y don't our grandmothers have these problems?)

Allahua'lam :-)



Re: Putting off babies can raise breast cancer risk
Mona
02/14/02 at 10:10:13
assalamu alaikum,

Thanks for posting the above article. It is interesting. But, if I may, I'd like to point out the key sentence in the above artice, that is [quote]Researchers tracked 91,000 [color=red]French[/color] women aged 40 to 65 over ten years...[/quote]

Only if French women have a fairly similar genetic makeup and lifestyles -especially in relation to intoxicants, smoking & promiscuity- to Muslim women, can one extrapolate the results of the study to include the latter.  Otherwise, take everything you read, however scientific and technical it may sound, with heaps of salts.  

You gotta to take precautions, however, and learn to read warning signs. For all my akhawaat, married and unmarried, young and not-so young, please learn and practise self-exams to detect any lumps or tumors. Early detection cuts the risks of metastasis (wide spread of cancerous mass) by many fold.  

But stay away from French studies, their results tend to be dubious! We need Muslim studies!

Wassalam
Sr. Mona (who is still doing her PhD in biochemistry ergo her nerdy reply)


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