Here are two leftovers about breast cancer and diet:

The first one is quoted directly from a bulletin from NIH (National Institute of Health) and AARP (American Association of Retired Persons)

Fat consumption was shown to be directly related to invasive breast cancer in women who have gone through menopause in the NIH-AARP Diet…The study showed a significant link between high fat diets and breast cancer. Doubling one’s total fat consumption from 20 percent of calories to 40 percent of calories was associated with a 15 percent greater risk of breast cancer, no matter what the source (butter and margarine, vegetable oil, meat, or dairy products,)or type of fat (saturated, monosaturated, or polyunsaturated.)

While the article states more research is needed to understand this link more fully, for now I think women need to look at the amount of fat they take in, although I still think there are good fats and bad fats.

This  second “leftover” is from one of my favorite magazines, Nutrition Action, from Center for the Science in the Public Interest.

According to Nutrition Action,  a study that involved 50,000 postmenopausal women showed that those women who ate an average of one half grapefruit every other day were at a higher risk for cancer. The experts think that the juice from the grapefruit can cause higher levels of blood estrogen. They state that a key enzyme in the juice (cytochrome p450 3A4) inhibits the work of the liver and small intestine to metabolize drugs and women’s estrogen. The magazine article suggests keeping grapefruit eating to 1/2 once or twice each week until more research confirms this.

Who would have thought a fruit like grapefruit had such an effect on our bodies?

This entry was posted on Thursday, November 12th, 2009 at 12:04 pm and is filed under Leftovers. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.