Breast Cancer
In 1990 in the United States, 43,391 women died of breast cancer. Tests for early signs of this disease also are controversial. If, as a woman, you have a family history of breast cancer, ask your doctor when, how, and how often you should be tested. Self-examination of the breasts and mammography has saved lives through early detection. But some doctors rate the tests as ineffective, saying much is missed in self-exams. Because of denser breast tissue in younger women, mammograms don’t always reveal cancerous sites.
Dr. Eyre urges that initial mammograms be taken at age 40, then – depending on the study’s results, the patient’s risk factors, and family history – every 2 years until age 50, and yearly after that.
Some risk factors for breast cancer reportedly include alcohol consumption, a high-fat diet, and obesity. Researchers are testing a diet low in animal fats as a possible preventive. Detection is difficult: “Of women who get breast cancer,” Dr. Eyre says, “seventy percent have no known or identifiable risk factor.”
Lung Cancer
“In America, statistics show that smoking accounts for 90 percent of lung cancer in men and 85 percent in women,” Dr. Eyre says.
The American Cancer Society projects that lung cancer will kill 94,000 men and 59,000 women this year, and it cites a terrifying mortality rate rise since 1960 – up by 104 percent in men and 452 percent in women! And a jump in lung cancer for the young is almost certain: a new study by the University of Michigan showed a 2 percent rise in smoking among schoolchildren in the 8th, 10th and 12th grades.
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