“World Menopause Day is held every year on the 18th October”.
Ways to Help to reduce your risk of breast cancer
Contact the Australian Menopause Centre on 1300 883 405 for more information!
Regular Breast Screening – Women over the age of 50 and up to the age of 74 are advised to have regular breast screen and this is a free test in Australia through Breastscreen Australia. Women at high risk of developing breast cancer should consider screening more regularly and younger than age 50.
Control your weight 1 – Being overweight can increase your risk of developing breast cancer. At menopause, the oestrogen produced by your body is is mainly derived from fat. Having more fat has been shown to increase your risk as it often is accompanied by an increase in the amount of insulin produced.
Exercise 2 – any increase in the amount of exercise that you do will help you to reduce your risk of serious health problems including breast and other forms of cancer. Try to exercise daily if possible or at least several times per week. Even a 10 minute walk each day will make a difference to your overall health – helping to control your weight and helping to keep your heart healthy. You could start at 5 minutes and work your way up – you will be surprised at how much easer it becomes once you get into the habit.
Try and keep from sitting for too long. Too much time sitting 3 – and these days with TV and computers, we can second too much time sitting down. Try and reduce the amount of sitting time – stand occasionally for short periods of time, move about. Get up and take a brief walk around the room or outside if you can.
Avoid alcohol 3 – either reduce or stop altogether if you can. The risk of breast cancer increases significantly for women who drink even 2 or 3 glasses of alcohol per day.
Hormone Replacement Therapy 4, 5 – Research has shown that postmenopausal women who take a combination of estrogen and progestin are more likely to develop breast cancer on average all women whether on any form of hormone replacement therapy or not, have an increased risk of breast cancer of almost one in eight. If you need hormone replacement therapy then micronized progesterone and bio-identical oestrogen might be considered.
Contact us today to speak with one of our experienced doctors and see if the Australian Menopause Centre can help you.
1 Connecting the dots between breast cancer, obesity and alcohol consumption in middle-aged women: ecologicaland case control studies. R. Miller, C. Wilson, J. Chapman, I. Flight, A.-M. Nguyen, C. Fletcher Ij Ramseyhttps://bmcpublichealth.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s12889-018-5357-1
2 Physical Exercise and Reduced Risk of Breast Cancer in Young Women. Bernstein L, Henderson BE, Hanisch R, Sullivan-Halley J, K. Ross RK. Journal of the National Cancer Institute, vol 86, September 21, 1994
3 Sitting Too Much Increases Cancer Risk in Women -American cancer Society https://www.cancer.org/latest-news/sitting-too-much-increases-cancer-risk-in-women.html http://radonc.wdfiles.com/local–files/part-2/RANZCR_Stats_1996b.pdf
4 Women’s Health Initiative https://www.whi.org/SitePages/WHI%20Home.aspx
5 E3N study https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC2211383/
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