If older female cancer survivors sit less and move more, they can reduce their chances of death

Sitting less and moving more can decrease the risks of death in older female cancer survivors, a new study reports.

The findings were outlined recently at the American Heart Association’s Epidemiology and Prevention/Lifestyle and Cardiometabolic Health Scientific Sessions in New Orleans.

 

Dr. Keith Diaz

According to a recent story in the AHA news, the risk of death from cardiovascular disease and other causes for older women with a history of cancer can be dramatically lowered. The piece goes on to quote Dr. Keith Diaz, a professor of behavioral medicine at Columbia University Medical Center in New York as saying that "walking —  at any intensity — matters."

Many adults, says Diaz, who was not involved in the study that combines two studies that followed 2,379 post-menopausal women for about eight years, "now spend the majority of  their day sitting, not engaged in physical activity. And for cancer survivors, this issue is likely even more pronounced due to the physical toll of cancer treatment and recovery."

Sedentary behavior, the AHA News report notes, raises the risk considerably: "Every 102 minutes of sitting time per day was linked to a 30% higher risk of death from cardiovascular disease and a 12% higher risk of death from any cause."

AHA and federal guidelines "recommend adults engage in moderate physical activity for at least 150 minutes each week, or 75 minutes of vigorous activity, or a combination of both."

The story also says that "researchers found that benefits maxed out at 5,000 to 6,000 steps per day and one hour of moderate to vigorous  physical activity a day."

But at least "one hour of moderate to vigorous activity each day, such as  biking or brisk walking, reduced the risk of death from heart disease and stroke by 60%, as well as 40% from any cause."

The women in the study averaged 74 years of age. Half had been diagnosed with breast cancer and the rest had other cancers, including endometrial, lung, colon, and ovarian.

Discussing the study's shortcomings, Dr. Eric Hyde, lead study author and a research analyst at the University of California, San Diego, suggests that "in future studies, physical activity should be measured at several critical time points, such as before cancer diagnosis, during treatment, and after treatment." 

 

More information on cancer in older females can be found in Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer, a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten aimed at male caregivers. My other books are MysteryDates — How to keep the sizzle in your relationship; The Roving I, a compilation of  70 of my newspaper columns; and Grampy and His Fairyzona Playmates, a whimsical fantasy intended for 6- to 10-year-olds that I co-authored with my then 8-year-old granddaughter.

Medical risks expanding along with waistlines

Cancer dangers from obesity are growing exponentially, article in The Washington Post indicates

Obesity may overtake smoking as the No. 1 preventable cause of cancer.

According to a story by Laurie McKinley in The Washington Post a while back, the change is due to waistlines continuing "to expand while tobacco use plummets."

McKinley notes that Dr. Otis Brawley, ex-American Cancer Society (ACS) chief medical officer who's now a Johns Hopkins oncologist, says the switch may take five to 10 years.

Dr. Jennifer Ligibel

What's happening, she quotes Dr. Jennifer Ligibel, a breast oncologist at the Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, as saying, is that "a complex interplay of metabolism, inflammation and immunity…creates an environment that is more permissive for cancer."

The Post also quotes Dr. Jonathan Wright, a urologist at Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research, to the effect that "it does appear that the risk is greater the more obese you are."

Only about half the American public purportedly is aware of the link between excess weight and cancer. 

The deadly combo has long been known to increase the risk of heart disease and diabetes — and now is being associated, according to the Post, "with an increased risk of getting at least 13 types of cancer, including stomach, pancreatic, colorectal and liver malignancies, as well as postmenopausal breast cancer."

ACS researchers contend that "excess body weight is linked to about 8 percent of all cancers in the United States and about 7 percent of cancer deaths," McKinley reports.

She also writes that "compared with people of normal weight, obese patients are more likely to see their cancer come back and have a lower likelihood of survival. Perhaps more alarming, young people, who as a group are heavier than their parents, are developing weight-related malignancies, including colorectal cancer, at earlier ages than previous generations, experts say."

An article in JAMA Internal Medicine (the journal of the American Medical Association) several years ago maintained that "seven in 10 Americans are overweight or obese." But the obesity rate has been rising exponentially since that piece was published.

The type of cancer most associated with obesity, McKinley writes, "is endometrial, which develops in the lining of the uterus. Obese and overweight women are two to four times as likely to develop the disease as women of normal weight, and the risk rises with increased weight gain, according to the National Institutes of Health."

Statistics from that source also indicate that "people who are overweight or obese are twice as likely to develop liver and kidney cancer, and about 1.5 times as likely to develop pancreatic cancer than normal-weight people, according to NIH."

Several researchers, McKinley says, "are running clinical trials to prove what many already believe — that losing weight reduces the odds of developing cancer or having a recurrence." 

If studies show that to be true, she adds, "doctors could prescribe a weight-loss program as standard therapy for breast cancer patients — much as cardiac rehabilitation is urged for heart-attack patients. That could pave the way for insurance coverage."

More details on health risks can be found in "Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer," a VitalityPress book that I, Woody Weingarten, aimed at male caregivers.

Up to 70% of cancers could be prevented

Old research challenged: 'Bad behavior trumps bad luck' when it comes to causes of diseases 

I've always been a believer in preventive medicine and a healthy lifestyle.

And a new analysis published in JAMA Oncology shows I've been on the right track.

The journal says between 40 and 70 percent of U.S. cancer deaths could be prevented if Americans stopped smoking, cut down on their alcohol, maintained a healthy weight and exercised at least 150 minutes each week.

In the meantime, cancer remains the second leading cause of death in the United States, behind heart disease, the article indicates.

Findings in the study conducted by the Harvard T.H. Chan School of Public Health in Boston and reported today by Melissa Healy in the Los Angeles Times suggest women who followed the preventive guidelines reduced their risk of breast cancer by 15 percent, lung cancer by 85 percent, other cancers somewhere in between.

Men did even better, as high as 90 percent for lung cancer.

A total of 89,571 women and 46,339 men participated in the analysis, which the Times said "was based on cancer rates and health behaviors in two large and long-running studies of health professionals — the Nurses' Health study and the Health Professionals Follow-Up Study," and which also used data from the National Cancer Institute.

The findings, according to the article, "present a significant challenge to research published last year that said as many as 80 percent of cancers might be attributable to factors beyond the control of individuals — the 'back luck' hypothesis. Instead the new research offers evidence that bad behavior trumps bad luck as a cause of cancer."

Edward Giovannucci

 Mingyang Song

The Times story quoted Dr. Mingyang Song of Massachusetts General Hospital and Dr. Edward Giovannucci of the Harvard T.H. Cohn School, the study's authors, as believing "primary prevention should remain a priority for cancer control."

Unfortunately, American adults remain vested in bad habits and bad lifestyle choices.

Apparently, about 17 percent, roughly 40 million, are still smoking cigarettes; obesity is a problem for 38 percent; almost a quarter of them do no exercise outside of job requirements; and 6.7 percent report they're heavy drinkers (with a full quarter  of adults acknowledging they engaged in binge drinking in the last month).

The top 10 causal factors account for nearly 75 percent of all deaths — with heart disease and cancer followed, in turn, by chronic lower respiratory disease, accidents, stroke, Alzheimer's, diabetes, flu and pneumonia, kidney disease and suicide.

Information and statistics on other studies can be found in "Rollercoaster: How a man can survive his partner's breast cancer," a VitalityPress book I, Woody Weingarten, have aimed at male caregivers.