Word: breast
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...majority of breast-cancer patients have radiation therapy as part of their treatment. Lower doses have made it safer than it once was, but radiotherapy still puts healthy tissue at risk. Now a study reported in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute suggests that targeted radio-therapy can work just as well as whole-breast therapy in preventing cancer recurrences. The approach, called partial breast irradiation, treats only areas nearest to the tumor, minimizing exposure of healthy tissues to X rays. It can also mean a shorter treatment and recovery period. --By Lisa McLaughlin
Meanwhile, lab studies on rats have alternately suggested that isoflavones inhibit and stimulate breast-cancer tumor growth. Recent studies showing that estrogen in hormone replacement therapy actually increases the risk of breast cancer and heart disease in postmenopausal women have scared some women...
...particular group of compounds in soy: the isoflavones, which are also found in lower concentrations in other legumes. Isoflavones are phytoestrogens, or plant estrogens, that weakly imitate the body's estrogen--sometimes they have an estrogenic effect, other times anti-estrogenic. They are thought to help stave off breast cancer, lower cholesterol and reduce the risk of heart disease, among other things. Just last month a study in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute suggested that isoflavones may also reduce the risk of endometrial cancer...
Support for the idea that soy products protect against breast cancer comes mainly from epidemiological studies in Asia, where people have routinely been eating soy for thousands of years and where women have markedly lower rates of breast cancer than in the U.S. But whether that's due to soy remains uncertain. "The cultures are just so different in so many ways, in diet and other lifestyle factors," says Mark Messina, a Port Townsend, Wash., nutritionist and an expert on soy. "By itself, the low breast-cancer rate in Asia doesn't provide much insight into the possible effect...
...think eating soy foods--tofu, soy milk or miso--in moderation, a couple of times a week, should be fine. That's the advice I would take if I had breast cancer or were at risk," says Anna Wu, professor of preventive medicine at the University of Southern California's Keck School of Medicine. On the other hand, Wu doesn't recommend taking soy in pill form or as a protein powder. "We have no data on that. I would not take it as a supplement," she says...