More good news for breast cancer patients! In a related story to Monday’s post about low fat diets reducing the risk of recurrence, a new study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association has shown for the first time that breast cancer patients who exercise for even a few hours every week can reduce their risk of death by up to 50 percent compared with women who are less active. This has to make you smile…with a disease that leaves most people feeling like they’ve lost all control of their own future, knowing that you can take a pro-active role in influencing your own prognosis is huge news!
“The study…analyzed 18 years of data on nearly 3,000 women with breast cancer who underwent standard treatment, which included chemotherapy, surgery, and radiation. The study drew its data from the Nurses’ Health Study, a long-running Harvard project that surveyed nearly 122,000 nurses about their lifestyles, diets, and other behaviors and tracked their health. It has yielded dozens of major insights about chronic disease in women.
Even women who walked at average pace just 1 hour per week, or the equivalent in other physical activity, reduced their risk of death by about 20 percent compared with inactive women. The researchers defined an average pace as 2 to 2.9 miles per hour. Those walking 3 to 5 hours weekly or the equivalent cut their risk by 50 percent. However, walking or engaging in other exercise more than 5 hours weekly offered no additional benefits.”
To me this study seems like a minor mile-stone. My experience with Oncology as it’s currently practiced has been that when you ask your doctor what you can to do to help increase your odds of beating this disease, they tell you that the most they can suggest is that you “eat lots of high calorie foods to help keep your weight up during chemotherapy.” Go figure. I’m now cautiously optimistic that these two high profile studies will make their way into the Oncology Clinic, and patients will start getting the information they so desperately need. Let’s just hope it doesn’t take ten years for it to happen. -Cary
Technorati Tags: Beating Cancer, Cancer, Cancer Blog, Exercise
