Breast cancer is a real risk for any woman and especially for women where breast cancer runs in the family. To know as much as you can about a health risk and risk factors related to breast cancer should be important to any woman. Of course, the exact causes of breast cancer and any other cancer is not exactly known, but there are risk factors that can lead to a higher probability for a woman to get breast cancer. One thing that is for certain--breast cancer is not contagious. You cannot get cancer from a cancer patient and breast cancer is not caused through touching or bruising of the breasts.
Risk factors that increase the chance of breast cancer are many, so here are a few risks you should know about. Age is one of the risk factors related to breast cancer. Most breast cancer is detected in women over 60 and is rarely seen in women before menopause.
Family history is one of the bigger ones on the list. If the mother or sister, or even daughter of a woman has been diagnosed with breast cancer, it is more likely that the woman will also develop breast cancer, especially if the family member got breast cancer before she turned 40 years old. Also, other relatives can also increase the likeliness of breast cancer, such as women in the father's side of the family.
If your breast was diagnosed with a certain set of abnormal cells in it, you are more likely to have breast cancer. These cells are not cancerous yet, but these changes of the breasts can be indicators for breast cancer.
Also, if you were diagnosed with cancer in one breast you are more likely to develop cancer in your other breast. This as well as certain changes in genes can cause breast cancer that is related to your own personal history.
Some studies show certain facts related to reproduction that is connected to a heightened risk of breast cancer. For example, if a woman is older when she gives birth to her first child, or a woman has had her first period before age 12, a woman who never has had any children and other such facts are connected to a higher risk for breast cancer. On the other hand, women that have had a miscarriage or an abortion as so many seem to believe, are not connected through those facts to breast cancer.
Also a factor for breast cancer is your race. More white women have been diagnosed with breast cancer than Asian, African American or Latin American women.
Something to think about for many of women is the factor that women that are obese during and after their menopause are at a higher risk of getting breast cancer. Other health and lifestyle related issues have also been connected to breast cancer by some studies. For example, woman that did not work out throughout their life are a higher risk for breast cancer than woman that stayed fit. The more alcohol a woman drinks, the greater seems to be her risk of breast cancer.
Since nobody exactly knows all about cancer, many studies are still being worked on and some studies might even give a different opinion about some of the risk factors mentioned above. Before you panic because you and your family know one or more of these factors, you still might not get breast cancer. It is known that women that can show more than two of these factors still might not get breast cancer. Being at a heighten risk does not necessarily mean that you will get breast cancer. It is meant to keep you thinking and checking about it with regular checkups and breast self-exams.
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