Breast Cancer! Undestanding This Deadly Foe
Is any woman safe from getting this disease? Can anything be done to prevent it? And what comfort and support are needed by those fighting this foe?
Genetic Factors That Causes Breast Cancer.
A woman having a family member with breast cancer, such as a mother, a sister, or even a maternal aunt or grandmother, has an increased likelihood of developing it. If several of them had this disease, her risk is greater. Understandably, family members having the same genes tend to share the same environment.
Environmental Factors
Clearly there are environmental factors, broadly conceived, that are involved in triggering the disease. Since the female breast is one of the most radiosensitive parts of the body, women exposed to ionizing radiation have an increased risk of breast cancer. So do those exposed to toxic chemicals.
Another environmental factor is diet. Some suggest that breast cancer may be a vitamin-deficiency disease and point to a lack of vitamin D. This vitamin helps the body absorb calcium, which may in turn help prevent uncontrolled cell growth.
Other studies link the fat in diet, it is not as a cause, but as a trigger to breast cancer. Study conducted revealed that the death rate from breast cancer was the highest in countries like the United States, where the intake of fat and animal protein is high. In Japan, women historically have a low risk for breast cancer, but that risk has been rising dramatically, concurrent with a ‘Westernization’ of eating habits; that is, from a low-fat to high-fat diet.
Excess calories can put on excess pounds, and women who are severely overweight are thought to have about a threefold higher risk of breast cancer, especially women past menopause. Body fat produces estrogen, a female hormone that can act adversely on breast tissue, leading to cancer.
Personal History and Hormones as a Cause
Within a woman’s breast is a rich hormonal milieu that produces changes in the breast all throughout her life. In some women, however, the exposure of breast tissue to prolonged hormone stimulation will set off a series of cytological changes that eventually result in malignant [cancerous] conversion. For this reason it is thought that women who have had an early menarche, by age 12, or have a delayed menopause, in the mid-50, have a higher risk.
Reports on the relationship between oral contraceptives and breast cancer suggest little risk from use. However, there emerges a subgroup of women who are at higher risk. Younger women, women who have never had children, and women who have used birth-control pills for a long time may have as much as a 20-percent higher risk of breast cancer.
Why Is The Breast So Vulnerable?
While we examined the makeup of the female breast, it explains why it is so vulnerable to cancer. Within it are ducts, tiny passages that channel milk from milk-producing sacs to the nipple. Lining the ducts are cells that divide and change continually in response to a woman’s monthly cycle, preparing her for pregnancy, lactation, and nursing her young. It is in these ducts where most breast cancers develop.
Thus, Breast cancer begins when an irregular cell divides, loses control of its growth mechanism, and begins to proliferate. Such cells do not stop reproducing, and in time they overwhelm the surrounding healthy tissue, turning a healthy organ into a diseased one.
What To Know About Metastasis
When cancer is contained within the breast, the malignancy can be removed. When breast cancer has spread to distant sites in the body, it is called metastatic breast cancer. This is the most likely cause of death in breast-cancer patients. As cancer cells multiply in the breast and the tumor grows in size, cancer cells can quietly and secretly exit the primary tumor site and penetrate blood vessel walls and lymph nodes.
At this point tumor cells can travel to distant parts of the body. If they evade the body’s immune defenses, which include natural killer cells circulating in both the blood and the lymph fluids, these malignant cells can colonize vital organs, such as the liver, lungs, and brain. There they can proliferate and spread again, after making these organs cancerous. Once metastasis has begun, a woman’s life is in jeopardy.
Genetic Factors That Causes Breast Cancer.
A woman having a family member with breast cancer, such as a mother, a sister, or even a maternal aunt or grandmother, has an increased likelihood of developing it. If several of them had this disease, her risk is greater. Understandably, family members having the same genes tend to share the same environment.
Environmental Factors
Clearly there are environmental factors, broadly conceived, that are involved in triggering the disease. Since the female breast is one of the most radiosensitive parts of the body, women exposed to ionizing radiation have an increased risk of breast cancer. So do those exposed to toxic chemicals.
Another environmental factor is diet. Some suggest that breast cancer may be a vitamin-deficiency disease and point to a lack of vitamin D. This vitamin helps the body absorb calcium, which may in turn help prevent uncontrolled cell growth.
Other studies link the fat in diet, it is not as a cause, but as a trigger to breast cancer. Study conducted revealed that the death rate from breast cancer was the highest in countries like the United States, where the intake of fat and animal protein is high. In Japan, women historically have a low risk for breast cancer, but that risk has been rising dramatically, concurrent with a ‘Westernization’ of eating habits; that is, from a low-fat to high-fat diet.
Excess calories can put on excess pounds, and women who are severely overweight are thought to have about a threefold higher risk of breast cancer, especially women past menopause. Body fat produces estrogen, a female hormone that can act adversely on breast tissue, leading to cancer.
Personal History and Hormones as a Cause
Within a woman’s breast is a rich hormonal milieu that produces changes in the breast all throughout her life. In some women, however, the exposure of breast tissue to prolonged hormone stimulation will set off a series of cytological changes that eventually result in malignant [cancerous] conversion. For this reason it is thought that women who have had an early menarche, by age 12, or have a delayed menopause, in the mid-50, have a higher risk.
Reports on the relationship between oral contraceptives and breast cancer suggest little risk from use. However, there emerges a subgroup of women who are at higher risk. Younger women, women who have never had children, and women who have used birth-control pills for a long time may have as much as a 20-percent higher risk of breast cancer.
Why Is The Breast So Vulnerable?
While we examined the makeup of the female breast, it explains why it is so vulnerable to cancer. Within it are ducts, tiny passages that channel milk from milk-producing sacs to the nipple. Lining the ducts are cells that divide and change continually in response to a woman’s monthly cycle, preparing her for pregnancy, lactation, and nursing her young. It is in these ducts where most breast cancers develop.
Thus, Breast cancer begins when an irregular cell divides, loses control of its growth mechanism, and begins to proliferate. Such cells do not stop reproducing, and in time they overwhelm the surrounding healthy tissue, turning a healthy organ into a diseased one.
What To Know About Metastasis
When cancer is contained within the breast, the malignancy can be removed. When breast cancer has spread to distant sites in the body, it is called metastatic breast cancer. This is the most likely cause of death in breast-cancer patients. As cancer cells multiply in the breast and the tumor grows in size, cancer cells can quietly and secretly exit the primary tumor site and penetrate blood vessel walls and lymph nodes.
At this point tumor cells can travel to distant parts of the body. If they evade the body’s immune defenses, which include natural killer cells circulating in both the blood and the lymph fluids, these malignant cells can colonize vital organs, such as the liver, lungs, and brain. There they can proliferate and spread again, after making these organs cancerous. Once metastasis has begun, a woman’s life is in jeopardy.
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