Avril Har­ry,

RN, BSc On­col­o­gy Nurs­ing

Pink Hi­bis�cus Breast Health Spe­cial­ist

Breast health is a crit­i­cal part of our over­all health and well-be­ing. The cur­rent sta­tis­tic is that one in eight peo­ple will be di­ag­nosed with breast can­cer. Thus, we can­not overem­pha­size how im­por­tant breast health aware­ness is for our women, both young and old alike, as well as the men.

There are things each and every per­son can do in an at­tempt to re­duce the risk of de­vel­op­ing breast health is­sues, one of which is breast can­cer. This is es­pe­cial­ly so now that breast can­cer is a dis­ease that most women sur­vive, thanks to ear­li­er di­ag­no­sis and bet­ter treat­ment.

As dis­cussed in our breast spe­cial­ist Dr Ra­jen Ram­paul's ar­ti­cle last week, we are al­so see­ing a some­what new phe­nom­e­na–that of younger women be­ing di­ag­nosed. This fact fur­ther em­pha­sis­es the im­por­tance of qual­i­ty com­pre­hen­sive breast screen­ing.

There are three main risk fac­tors which have noth­ing to do with lifestyle. They are age, be­ing fe­male, and hav­ing a sig­nif­i­cant fam­i­ly his­to­ry. And on­ly those peo­ple with the few genes close­ly as­so­ci­at­ed with breast can­cer can be ful­ly aware of their own risk. At the end of the day, all can­cers are pre­dis­posed to be ge­net­ic but they need oth­er trig­gers in lifestyle and the en­vi­ron­ment.

For the most part, since we can­not al­ways con­trol our en­vi­ron­ment and we cer­tain­ly can­not amend our ge­net­ics or age, it stands to rea­son that what we do and put in­to our body plays a role.

How healthy is your di­et? Ask your­self the fol­low­ing ques­tions:

�2 Does my dai­ly meals con­sist of more plant-based foods as op­posed to more processed meats and fried foods?

�2 Do I con­sume fast foods more than twice per week?

�2 Do I have a greater num­ber of sug­ary juices as op­posed to a dai­ly in­take of eight or more glass­es of wa­ter per day?

�2 Do I drink in ex­cess of two al­co­holic bev­er­ages dai­ly?

�2 Do I con­sume four to five por­tions of fruit dai­ly?

A healthy di­et and lifestyle are as­so­ci­at­ed with over­all good health. There are now stud­ies which in­di­cate that di­et and lifestyle may play a role in avert­ing breast can­cer and its re­cur­rence. The fol­low­ing are note­wor­thy lifestyle ad­just­ments to con­sid­er:

�2 Con­sume a healthy di­et with an em­pha­sis on plant foods.

�2 Choose foods and bev­er­ages in amounts that help achieve and main­tain a healthy weight.

�2 Lim­it con­sump­tion of processed meat and red meat.

�2 Eat at least 2.5 cups of veg­eta­bles and fruits each day.

�2 Choose whole grains in­stead of re­fined grain prod­ucts.

�2 If you drink al­co­holic bev­er­ages, lim­it con­sump­tion. Con­sume no more than one drink per day for women or two per day for men.

�2 Ex­er­cise reg­u­lar­ly, it is rec­om­mend­ed at least four hours a week

�2 Avoid chem­i­cals than can in­crease your chances of de­vel­op­ing can­cer (car­cino­gens).

�2 Breast­feed your ba­bies, once it is pos­si­ble.

Re­mem­ber that what we eat can make a dif­fer­ence. Now is a good time to get on the road to good breast health.