600,000 cases of cancer 'may have been avoided' | Irish Examiner

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More than four in 10 cancers could be avoided if people made changes to their lifestyle, according to Cancer Research UK. Life style changes such as smoking cessation , balanced diet and weight management would have prevented 600,000 cases of various cancers.
Smoking accounted for more than 314,000 cases in the past five years, the charity said.
A further 145,000 cancers might have been averted if more people ate a balanced diet low in red and processed meat and salt, and high in vegetables, fruit, and fibre.
Maintaining a healthy weight could have prevented around 88,000 cases, while tens of thousands of cancers were linked to excess alcohol, failing to protect the skin from sun, and lack of exercise. Read the whole article here:
600,000 cases of cancer 'may have been avoided' | Irish Examiner

Brest types – No perfect symmetry

Photo By Ambro on freedigitalphotos.net

You’ve been in enough locker rooms to know that every woman’s breasts look different. “Almost no one has perfectly symmetrical breasts," says Mary Jane Minkin, M.D., professor of obstetrics and gynecology at Yale School of Medicine. "If they do look exactly like one another, it’s probably thanks to plastic surgery,” she adds.
Still, you’ve probably wondered why your breasts are the way they are. Shape Magazine called up experts  to glean a greater understanding behind what determines the shape, size, and feel of your dynamic duo.
Genetics
Far and away, genetics plays the biggest role in the size and shape of your breasts. “Your genes also influence the levels of your hormones, which affect your breast tissue,” says Richard Bleicher, M.D., surgical oncologist and director of the Breast Fellowship Program at Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia. “Genes determine how dense your breasts are, as well as what your skin is like, which affects the appearance of your breasts.” A study in the journal BMC Medical Genetics analyzed data from more than 16,000 women and found a total of seven genetic factors were significantly associated with breast size. “Your breast characteristics can come from both sides of your family, so genes from your dad’s side can affect what your breasts end up looking like too,” Minkin says.
Your Weight
No matter how big or small your breasts are to begin with, a large proportion of the tissue is made up of fat. So it’s no coincidence that your breasts expand when you do. Similarly, as you lose weight, your breast size could change too. How much fat you lose in your breasts when you drop weight may depend, in part, on the composition of your breasts. Women with dense breast tissue tend to have more tissue and less fatty tissue. If that's you, when you lose weight, you may not notice as significant of a decrease in your breasts as a woman who has a greater proportion of fatty tissue in her breasts to begin with. You can’t feel whether you have dense or fatty breasts (only a mammogram or other imaging would show this), so you may not know which category your breasts fall into. And as for those tiny women with big breasts? Thank genetics!
Your Age
Enjoy your perky girls while you can! “Like everything else, gravity takes its toll on the breasts,” Bleicher says. Beneath the surface, your Cooper’s ligaments, delicate bands of tissue, help hold everything up. “They’re not true ligaments like those that hold muscle to bone, they’re fibrous structures in the breast,” Bleicher says. Over time, they can wear out like overstretched rubber bands and become less supportive—eventually causing sagging and drooping. The good news: You can fight back by regularly sporting well-fitting supportive bras in order to reduce the gravitational pull on your Cooper’s ligaments.
Breastfeeding
It’s the blessing and the curse of pregnancy: Your breasts swell to porn-star size while pregnant and nursing, but deflate like a post-birthday party balloon when you wean. It’s not entirely understood why they change so dramatically, but it may be due to fluctuations in hormones and the fact that the skin stretches as the breasts become engorged and may not fully contract to their pre-baby firmness after nursing, Bleicher says.
Exercise
You can do all the chest presses and flies that you like, but they’re unlikely to have any noticeable impact on the appearance of your dynamic duo. “Your breasts sit on top of the pectoral muscles, but aren’t part of them so you can develop stronger muscles underneath your breasts without changing their size or shape,” says Melissa Crosby, M.D., associate professor of plastic surgery at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center. There are, however, a few exceptions. Bodybuilders and women who participate in fitness competitions often have such low body fat that their breasts appear firmer especially when sitting on top of piles of chest muscle, Crosby says. “There’s some data demonstrating that breast size and density also changes in women who do a significant amount of aerobic activity,” Bleicher says. “This is probably due to the fact that you lose body fat, but your breast tissue components don’t change so you develop denser breasts when you exercise more.”
This material is based on the  article by Paige Fowler is published in Shape Magazine.
Stay tuned for the new information on another blood test which may indicate breast cancer in its
early stages.

Lululemon supplier says see-through yoga pants made to specs as retailer’s stock falls (There's no such thing as bad publicity)

The Taiwanese supplier behind the see-through yoga pants recalled by Lululemon Athletica Inc said on Tuesday it followed design specifications and the Canadian retailer had merely misjudged customer tastes.Lululemon said late Monday it had recalled batches of its stretchy black signature yoga pants because of an unacceptable “level of sheerness” created during the manufacturing process.By now you may have heard that Lululemon's latest batch of popular black yoga pants are too racy for the average yogi -- but fans of the form-fitting favourites have taken to social media to suggest creative solutions.Some people even commented that "The material may not have changed, but something did - the clientele. Sorry ladies, some of you just stretch the material too much"

Vegetarians 'cut heart risk by 32%'

 
Ditching meat and fish in favor of a vegetarian diet can have a dramatic effect on the health of your heart, research suggests.
A study of 44,500 people in England and Scotland showed vegetarians were 32% less likely to die or need hospital treatment as a result of heart disease.Differences in cholesterol levels, blood pressure and body weight are thought to be behind the health boost.
The findings were published in  American Journal of Clinical Nutrition.
Heart disease is a major blight in Western countries. It kills 94,000 people in the UK each year, more than any other disease, and 2.6 million people live with the condition.
The heart's own blood supply becomes blocked up by fatty deposits in the arteries that nourish the heart muscle. It can cause angina or even lead to a heart attack if the blood vessels become completely blocked.Scientists at the University of Oxford analyzed data from 15,100 vegetarians and 29,400 people who ate meat and fish.Over the course of 11 years, 169 people in the study died from heart disease and 1,066 needed hospital treatment - and they were more likely to have been meat and fish eaters than vegetarians.
Dr Francesca Crowe says: "The main message is that diet is an important determinant of heart health. "I'm not advocating that everyone eats a vegetarian diet. The diets are quite different. Vegetarians probably have a lower intake of saturated fat so it makes senses there is a lower risk of heart disease."The results showed the vegetarians had lower blood pressure, lower levels of "bad" cholesterol and were more likely to have a healthy weight.
Tracy Parker, from the British Heart Foundation, said: "This research reminds us that we should try to eat a balanced and varied diet - whether this includes meat or not.
"But remember, choosing the veggie option on the menu is not a shortcut to a healthy heart. After all, there are still plenty of foods suitable for vegetarians that are high in saturated fat and salt."If you're thinking of switching to a vegetarian diet, make sure you plan your meals carefully so that you replace any lost vitamins and minerals, such as iron, that you would normally get from meat."