Keeping your Breasts Healthy

There is a lot of fear associated with breast cancer. Our breasts are such an important part of us and are tied up in providing food for our babies and our sexuality. If fear is one reaction you have when someone mentions breast cancer, turn that fear into action.
Remember, although breast cancer occurs in 1 out of 11 women in New Zealand, this means 10 out of 11 women do not get it. There are things you can do to reduce your risk.


How to Keep Your Breasts Healthy
Breast feed your babies. This has been shown to reduce the rate of breast cancer. As well as doing great things for your baby, it is healthy for your breasts. Lower your alcohol use. There is a direct relationship between alcohol use and breast cancer. The more we drink the higher the risk. There is some suggestion that taking folic acid may reduce this risk as heavy drinkers often have low folic acid levels (this is a vitamin in green vegetables, tomatoes). That is the same folic acid that women take during pregnancy. Keep your weight under control. This is extremely important. There is an association between being overweight and getting breast cancer. Estrogen is produced in fat cells so the less fat cells you have the less estrogen stimulation on your breasts.
Exercise!: exercise has been associated with a lower risk of breast cancer. This is probably because it improves the immune system and also helps keep the weight to a healthy range. Eat the right fats: Increase omega 3 fats and decrease saturated fats. I.e. Increase oily fish such as mackerel, salmon, herring, sardines, and other foods such as lentils, beans, peas, and decrease red meat and dairy products. Animal products tend to promote inflammation and may have pesticide or antibiotic or hormone residues in them which then concentrate themselves in breast tissue.
Choose olive oil (oleic acid is known to be protective against breast cancer) rather than other oils.
Try miso soup - there is a good study showing that this may be protective.
Eat lots of fruit and vegetables; they contain important antioxidants that stop cancer cells.
Have a regular bowel motion every day: this is important because it helps reduce toxin build up and estrogen load. Increase fibre in diet to do this.
Examine your own breasts: it is a good idea to know what your breasts normally feel like so if there is a change you can get it checked out. This is best done when hormone levels are low ie day 1-3 of your period.
Mammograms are x-rays of the breast taken that detect breast cancer before you can feel it. In that way the cancer is picked up very early and chances of surviving breast cancer are greater than if the cancer was bigger. Breast Screen Aotearoa is available to all NZ women residents from age 45 to 69 years. Many women worry about the radiation of mammograms. These machines have improved over the last 30 years and now have to have low dose radiation. The dose is around 0.1-0.2 rads per picture. To put this in perspective, if a woman then has to go and have radiation treatment for breast cancer, she would receive around 5000 rads. If a woman had yearly mammograms from age 40 - 90 years of age she would have received a total of 20-40 rads. In other words the dose of radiation received in a mammogram is about equivalent to the dose that you would receive from natural background radiation from your surroundings over a 3 month period