It is easy to think that mammograms save lives when so many women espouse their belief that the mammogram saved their life because it detected their breast cancer much earlier on than say a self breast exam would have. But I just read a very interesting perspective from another specialist who says that mammograms may [...]
Huh? Wait what? That was how I looked at the headline that suggested that drinking alcohol, something that has long been linked to increasing the risk of developing breast cancer in women, may actually help to prevent the spread of the deadly disease. I though I was either reading it incorrectly or that it may [...]
When it comes to most types of breast cancer, there is one fact that is pretty much undisputed. That fact is that excessive estrogens, especially those of a synthetic nature that did not originate in the female body itself, via its own natural processes, may actually accelerate breast cancer. However, it is unknown specifically what [...]
Well, the month of breast cancer and breast health awareness if officially over, and this time it appears that the month dedicated to one of America’s favorite subjects in both health and obsession, breasts, has garnered a lot of following. There have been numerous news stories about breast cancer awareness month of October 2011. From [...]
I’ve been reading some very interesting things on Susan G Komen and other breast cancer nonprofit organizations that likely started off as meaning well. They have, however, evolved into organizations that may be giving a lot of their money to pharmaceutical companies to come up with drugs that can be more toxic than the cancer [...]
Critters for the Cure is a great organization that helps to fund financial support for women going through breast cancer treatment. It also helps to fund breast cancer research in an effort to help defeat and treat this disease which has become so pervasive in American culture for women. If you’d like to help support [...]
As with most other cancer and pre-cancer screenings, the breast cancer screening techniques have had their fair share of criticism and doubts over the years. The latest argument over whether women at a certain age should get mammograms has really muddied the waters more for women who are concerned about their breast health. It’s actually [...]
The mammogram debate never seems to stop raging. Today we hear that they aren’t as necessary as the medical profession would have us believe, and tomorrow we may hear that they are the worst thing you can do for your body, and actually cause breast cancer. The next we may hear that it’s all hooey [...]
There are more and more findings in breast cancer research, and many of them point to the fact that some women have such high predispositions to get the disease that they might as well do something to significantly lower their risk early on in life. There was actually even an episode about a woman who [...]
Soy has been bandied about as both a breast cancer fighter, and a good thing for women to eat to help ward off breast cancer for it’s natural phyto (plant based) nutrients, and as the bad guy, something that should be avoided by women, especially women who already have or have had breast cancer. Soy, [...]
Boy am I happy that a lot of the foods I naturally hold dear and find delicious are actually foods that offer superior nutritional benefits as a defense against breast cancer. One of the foods that I really have grown to love which helps prevent breast cancer, and other forms of cancer as well, is [...]
I can tell you, my personal preference is to not wear underwire bras, although when I first started wearing bras and wanted to make my rather small breasts stand up and out a little more, I favored these types of bras because they seemed to give my breasts more shape and lift. But there have [...]
Suzanne Somers sure has come a long way since her days playing the airheaded but lovable part of the room mate triangle of Three’s Company. She became an instant sex symbol, and her blond good looks along with her long tan legs earned her a top spot in the poster girl for sexiness contest. Who [...]
There has been a body of research that has been released lately that definitely may cause some eyebrows to raise. Why? Well, because it’s very honest and blunt, and in my opinion, is probably also very valid. However, it seems to some that it may point the finger at the person who gets cancer as [...]
When it comes to surviving breast cancer, which becomes deadly after it reaches a certain stage, and is much more treatable when it is caught early on, it seems that one’s mental state may be key to surviving this disease. It may be the difference between permanent remission and recurrence, and life and death, so [...]
A bone building drug that was thought to perhaps prevent breast cancer recurrence in breast cancer patients, and to potentially even help those that never had breast cancer to not get it, has recently been tested clinically in trials to see if it really offers benefit. The benefits tested were for two groups apparently, for [...]
SO Many women are still confused about what is right for them when it comes to deciding when they should start getting mammograms. Even women in their thirties sometimes are being encouraged to start getting yearly mammographies by their doctors because they have indicated they have a family history of the disease. But there are [...]
Sometimes when you read so many conflicting studies, it can be really difficult to know what to believe. In the end, you have to listen to your own intuition and experience. How does eating a certain food or drinking a certain drink, or taking a certain supplement make you feel? Do you get sick often [...]
While everyone knows that eating a lot of dark, leafy greens in the diet is essential to good health, we also have heard a lot of whispers – well, lately – more like shouts – about the health benefits of pure, organic olive oil. Why is olive oil so healthy for you when it is [...]
One well-established fact in the world of cancer prevention overall is increased exercise leads to lower rates of most types of cancer. This is due to a number of factors. Exercise is not only excellent and necessary for everyone’s health, it is also a powerful anti cancer agent because of these many health benefits. Not [...]
Christina Applegate famously was diagnosed at a very early stage of breast cancer. And God bless her, ever since then, she has become a warrior crusader for women to get screened and take care of themselves to help prevent breast cancer ever since then. Recently, she says that she firmly believes that having the MRI [...]
I read an article recently that, while intriguing, seemed incomplete to me. It referenced how two groups of women were studied and it was found that when tested, the women’s DNA who had reported taking multivitamin supplements and calcium supplements demonstrated a much better capability to repair it’s damage. This translates into not only a [...]
Well, to toss another aspect of confusion into the whole mammogram “are they really effective and useful or not” question that’s been circulating amongst women and health care professionals for a few years, there is yet another study that questions how effective this method is at early detection and preventing breast cancer deaths. While most [...]
The breast cancer drug Avastin, while it showed promise after an accelerated approval by the FDA back in 2008 due to promising cancer halting results when paired with a chemotherapy drug (unfortunately – you can tell, I’m not too sure personally about chemotherapy, it almost does more harm than good sometimes), has actually just gone [...]
Sheryl Crow, the talented singer who’s had a great career in the entertainment industry pretty much since I started college, has notoriously battled, and won, the breast cancer battle. She is one of the higher profile celebrities who has battled this dreadful disease, and thankfully, she has emerged from it stronger and healthier than before. [...]
Before I tell you about this interesting study, I must warn you that it has been criticized for being potentially misleading or even downright inaccurate. Now, of course, the people who are making these claims come from cleaning groups, but it’s always good to hear every side of the story. And quite frankly, I can [...]
Well, it looks like the uber champ of supplements, which also happens to enjoy huge commercial popularity and multiple studies being done on it’s potential health benefits, fish oil, has achieved yet another possible merit when it comes to preventive health. That new merit is a link to reduced risk of breast cancer in women [...]
Besides the efforts made to achieve the early detection and effective treatment of the breast cancer, about 20 % of patients with breast cancer die from the disease. The breast cancer is the second most often cause of death at women. We are all witnessing a very large number of sick women, but what is [...]
Women’s bodies, like men’s, are complicated. We have so many things that can go wrong with our reproductive organs, but we also have other body parts and concerns to look after as well. For men, it’s the prostate that is a major concern, especially as he ages. For women though, her breasts and her breast [...]
There are apparently now two drugs that are used as preventive measures for women who are at exceptionally high risk of getting breast cancer to take. They basically are prescribed if, through screening, you have shown a big predisposition toward getting breast cancer by expressing some of the genes that have been linked to a [...]
We all know that breast cancer is often fueled by changes in estrogen levels. We actually have a few different types of estrogen levels, and it hasn’t exactly been determined what is a “safe” level of this female hormone. However, excessive or highly fluctuating levels of estrogen have been linked to increases in breast cancer [...]
Some controversial news, or shall I say opinions, recently surfaced this week on recommendations by healthcare panels to prevent breast cancer – even up to one third of the cases of breast cancer here in the US, or perhaps the world. Their recommendation was that women eat less and exercise more. Because obesity is associated [...]
Recently in Poland, a slogan that was devised for campaigning in favor of breast cancer awareness was slammed as being sexist. Why? Well you tell me why. It went something like this “I check the breasts of all my workers” or something to that effect. Women are up in arms because it implies inappropriate sexual [...]
Apparently, aspirin, that cheap little pill that has fallen our of favor as a pain reliever of choice, but now has many other favorably viewed health benefits for your heart purportedly, may actually help you survive and avoid another recurrence of breast cancer if you are a breast cancer survivor. The study that was carried [...]
MRI’s are very expensive, and even if you have insurance, you can find yourself paying out the wazoo if you have to have one for a specific health problem or suspected issue. That is why some scoffed when MRI’s began to be used as scans for breast cancer, or returning breast cancer, but because of [...]
The latest mammogram guidelines that were set as a result of a government appointed US advisory panel pretty much had sparks flying from the beginning when they were recommended last year. The new recommendations had women waiting until they were 50, not 40, even if they were considered a high risk group for breast cancer [...]
John Kerry, the former Democratic presidential nominee, has a wife named Teresa Heinz who is currently fighting breast cancer. I feel bad describing her that way, but didn’t know how else to tell you who she is, although she is quite an active spokesperson herself, and John Kerry’s whitehouse bid seems somehow that it was [...]
Many women apparently are refusing to have MRIs done that could greatly benefit from one of the magnetic resonance imaging tests due to their status as high risk breast cancer potential patients. MRI’s have a much better chance at detecting breast cancer when it’s in the very earliest stages in these at risk women because [...]
For women with advanced breast cancer, there may be some very good news on the horizon in extending their lives longer and perhaps helping to put them into remission, even when all hope seems lost. But does it really improve their quality of life as well? To me that is the real question. So read [...]
A newer technique in screening for breast cancer may soon be taking hold as a preferred method over the often uncomfortable mammogram. It’s called the breast thermography. How it works is it takes thermal image “photos” of your breasts from several different angles and with your body in several different positions to get the different [...]
**Since I published this, there have now been back and forth debates between a president-appointed health adviser, Kathleen Sebelius, and the government appointed panel’s recommendations to not get mammograms til your fifty. The long and short of it? Just get them when it’s right for you, or consult your doctor to figure out what is [...]