Cancer: Am I at Risk?
Everybody has some risk of cancer. Some of us will have a form of cancer during their lifetime. According to American Cancer Society, cancer is likely to affect 1 in 2 men and 1 in 3 women. In 2003, the latest year for which statistics are available, in the United States were 556 902 cancer deaths, in a small decline compared with 2002. This downward trend seems to continue because earlier detection and better treatment are helping more people survive cancer. Cancer is still a deadly disease, causing 1 in every 4 deaths in the United States, second place after heart diseases.So, there is a general risk and a large amount of individual risk factors. These factors include tobacco use, diet, family history, your workplace and environment. You have to know that there are types of cancer who run in family. For instance, if a woman (mother, grandmother, sister, daughter) in your immediate family has invasive breast cancer, you have a bigger risk to develop the same type of disease and you will want to start having mammograms more often or at a younger age.
Smoking is a major cause of cancers of the lung, larynx, mouth and esophagus. So, if you smoke, today is the best day to quit. People who smoke two packs or more per day are nearly twenty times more likely to develop cancer than nonsmokers. People who quit smoking improve their live expectation, no matter how many cigarettes they used to smoke. I will try to explain again and again how noxious smoking is and how important is quitting smoking at any age.
By eating a low-fat, high-fiber diet and exercising regularly you can reduce your risk of certain types of cancer, including stomach cancer, large and small bowel cancer. Too much exposure to the sun can cause skin cancer, the most common form of cancer. Try to stay out of the sun as much as you can and wear protective clothing and sunscreen. There are many other risk factors for cancer and I will talk about all of them on this site. If you believe you were exposed to a cancer risk factor, ask me about it. I will tell you how big is your risk to develop cancer and what can you do to protect yourself.
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