Women’s Health issues are significant. One of the biggest women health issues is breast cancer. If you are not genetically predisposed to breast cancer, you can help avoid this too common women health issues. Breast cancer is more common in overweight women, women who smoke and women who drink alcohol. Diet and exercise. are essential when discussing women health topics especially breast cancer. Maintaining a normal weight and avoiding alcohol and smoking is the best advice to maintain Women’s Health you can receive. See your doctor regularly for check ups, pap smears, breast exams and mammography. The best way to beat any kind of cancer is by catching it in its early stages.
Eating the right foods makes a big difference in longevity for both sexes. Green, leafy vegetables, broccoli, and fresh fruit and vegetables are key to women diet plans. You can have an occasional indulgence, of course, but do maintain a healthy weight. An occasional dessert will not cause serious harm, but 30 extra pounds will!
Women’s fitness goes hand in hand with the women diet plans. Exercise helps increase heart strength and build muscle and bone density. Other women health topics reflect these issues: heart disease and osteoporosis. Heart disease is sometimes overlooked by doctors in women as the symptoms vary. Nausea and stomach upset is more common in women as a symptom of a heart attack. Women’s fitness plays an important role in maintaining heart and bone health. Genetic predispositions are things we cannot change, but lifestyles changes are doable for all women. Smoking is the absolute worst thing you can do for your health. If you don’t smoke, do not start! You will never ever see a smoker live to be 100! Smoking reeks havoc on every body system including the obvious: lungs! It causes damage and those nasty free radicals you hear about in every cell of the body. It causes premature aging of the skin, blood vessel injury and lung disease.
Healthy women care about their bodies, mind and spirit. Attitude plays a major role in maintaining good health. Optimistic people live longer than negative people. We all just have one body, ladies, let’s treat it the way it should be treated- with respect and care.
Posts tagged ‘Young’
It is said that 50 percent of young girls in the southeastern region, of Cameroon, an African country, are subjected to the brutal practice of breast ironing. In the Muslim north only around 10 percent of girls are involved. This cruel practice however, is on the increase, affecting one out of every four girls, which amounts to around 4 million in total, according to a new report by Current TV.
Using hot coconut shells, other objects and stones, the method involves the flattening, massaging and pounding a young girl’s growing breasts.
The Cameroonian mothers’ goal is to suspend their daughter’s development so men will not be tempted by their breasts. The mothers believe the procedure will keep their girls from rape, early pregnancy and sexual harassment, all of which will injure the family name. In Cameroonian society a girl is of marriageable age as soon as her breasts appear, as her breasts say she is available to have a sexual relationship.
Due to the improvement of the dietary patterns of the nation over the past 50 years, girls are starting to reach puberty as young as 9 years old. Half of all Cameroonian girls who develop under the age of nine have their breasts ironed.
Breast ironing can create numerous physical issues, like deformities and burns, plus the threat of breast cancer and psychological problems. It is not only exceedingly painful it causes tissue problem, which can cause difficulties with breastfeeding.
If a medical doctor can show that damage has been caused to the breasts, provided it is reported within a few months, the perpetrator can face up to three years in prison. The mothers however state the process is done out of genuine love and concern for their daughters.
Breast ironing is also practiced in Guinea-Bissau, West and Central Africa, including Chad, Togo, Benin and Guinea-Conakry.
A non-governmental campaign against breast ironing is now under way. However, traditional postpartum massaging, or belly ironing, is also widely practiced.
In belly ironing, a traditional broom dipped in boiling water is applied to whip the stomach of a woman who has just been delivered of a baby. A towel is soaked in boiling water to massage the various parts of the body and in some districts the woman is required to sit over a bucket of hot water so the vapor goes up into her vagina and uterus. Even this can cause vaginal infections, cervix damage, scars or burns. Cameroonian women accept it because tradition says it is vital to remove the remaining blood following the birth of a baby.
Other traditional and hurtful practices of females have involved such tortures as female genital circumcision, Chinese foot binding, rib-breaking corsets and the chastity belt.
In the latest piece of health news, a study has found an unfortunate risk factor for prostate cancer. It seems that men who start to lose hair at the age of 20 are more likely to develop prostate cancer in later life. Understanding this is important, because these men could be screened for the disease earlier and should keep watch for symptoms.
It is published in the “Annals of Oncology.” The study compared 388 men being treated for prostate cancer with a control group of 281 healthy men. It found that those with the disease were twice as likely as the healthy men to have started going bald when they were 20. But there was no perceived risk for men who started losing their hair around the ages of 30 and 40. An earlier receding hairline did not mean an earlier diagnosis of prostate cancer, just that the risk seemed to rise later in life.
Up to now, there has been conflicting evidence about the link between balding and prostate cancer. This one shows a link between baldness at the young age of 20 and the development of prostate cancer in later life.
Scientists don’t believe the general population needs to be screened for prostate cancer – only those who are at high risk of the disease. So identifying risk factors such as this is increasingly important. These men could take many cancer-preventative measures, including drugs if need be. They believe balding at the age of 20 could be one of these easily identifiable risk factors.
“Androgenic alopecia” (a.k.a. male pattern baldness) affects half of men throughout their lifetime. There is a link between baldness and androgenic hormones – and androgens also play a role in how prostate cancer develops. A drug used to treat hair loss has also been shown to lower rates of prostate cancer.
Researchers had men answer a questionnaire about history of prostate cancer and indicate on four pictures any balding patterns that they had at ages 20, 30 and 40. There were varying degrees of hair loss. The study ran for 28 months. The men with prostate cancer were diagnosed with the disease between the ages of 46 and 84.
The information revealed that any balding was associated with double the risk of prostate cancer later in life. This trend was lost at ages 30 and 40. They could not find any specific link between types of hair loss and the development of cancer, however. They think further research should be done to help fight the battle against prostate cancer.
For now, knowledge is power for men.
Nipple symptoms. This symptom is the first sign that most women should see if they feel that there is something wrong with their breasts. The nipples become retracted or indented. This usually points downward instead of the normal facing straight. Women may also notice unusual and frequent discharges from the nipple.
Very often, a young woman gets misdiagnosed. She detects a lump and she is told it is just lumpy breasts and it is followed for a while until doctors realize it’s something serious. Although this can be horrifying, in fact, it’s quite understandable, since the vast majority of lumps in women under 35 are totally benign and the risk of cancer is very low. The fact that cancer is not diagnosed immediately doesn’t mean that the young patient will die; since most breast cancers have been around 8 to 10 years, and whether it is diagnosed the minute you find it or six months later isn’t the critical factor.
After finding the lump and visiting with a surgeon, even though the lump would not aspirate, the breast surgeon had it in her mind, that since I did not fit a statistic, I was to young to get breast cancer, so I should forget about it and go home – if it bothered me to come back in six months, but not to worry. “You’re too young”. I did wait six months and the lump doubled.
Inflammatory breast cancer, although rare, is called “inflammatory” because the breast often looks swollen and red, or “inflamed.” This cancer accounts for 1 to 5 percent of all cancer cases in the United States. It tends to be diagnosed in younger women compared to non-inflammatory breast cancer. It occurs more frequently and at a younger age in African Americans than in Whites.
Breast tenderness is normal and common when young women are going through puberty. Often they ache, causing discomfort. Embarrassment can be felt by what is thought as the “overnight” growth of your breasts. “Honestly, I could swear they weren’t there yesterday!”. Getting used to your breasts developing, having breast tenderness, feeling uncomfortable, finding what bra is right for you, whilst going through possible confidence and self esteem issues, can be a huge ordeal!
Younger Women. Even though mammograms are not recommended for women under the age of 40, the cancer can and does develop in younger women. However, only about 7 percent of all breast cancers develop in women aged 40 and under.
Some people say that bigger breasts have a higher risk of cancer. Wrong again. What about age? Here we have some clear evidence that the age of a women is correlated with the risk of getting breast cancer. The younger you are the lower the risk. Breast cancer in women under twenty is almost non-existent. However, this does not mean that cancer can not develop at all.
Every day in October there is the National Breast Cancer Awareness Day. Millions of women worldwide are suffering from this type of tumor and, unfortunately, will continue to get breast cancer. Being aware of this can save your life. Do not just think about it in October.
It’s a decent idea … but probably won’t make a damn bit of difference.
See, anyone who is currently still smoking is either fully aware of the risks they are taking, or too stupid to live. And, speaking as an ex-smoker? No one who smokes thinks it will hurt their health before they can quit. A favorite quote of mine in my smoking days was, “Yes, every cigarette takes six minutes off your life, but it’s the ones at the end.”
More From The Stir: How’s This for a Stop Smoking Ad?
Smokers might not realize it, though, but even an otherwise young and healthy smoker deals with subtle health effects. Here are ways smoking might be affecting you right now in the prime of your youth:
Dull skin: One of the first positive changes you’ll notice after you quit is significantly brighter, more alive-looking skin. Nurses say they can tell smokers from nonsmokers by their skin alone.
Nagging cough: Walk too fast, step outdoors on a cold day, or inhale steam from a hot shower and all of a sudden you sound like a one-woman TB ward. That’s your lungs reacting to an overload of irritation.
Dead sense of smell and taste: Here’s one reason why smokers gain weight after they quit: Food all of a sudden tastes awesome, because they can finally really taste it.
Poor sleep: Nicotine is a stimulant and plays havoc with normal sleep patterns.
More From The Stir: Smoking ‘Baby’ has a 40-Cigarette a Day Habit
Poor circulation: Always suffering freezing hands and feet? Your habit may be to blame.
Increased flu risk: Smokers are more likely to get the flu and when they get it, more likely to get really sick from it.
Marriage troubles: Smokers are considerably more likely to divorce than nonsmokers.
Precancerous lesions: Smokers get sore, scaly white patches in their mouths that can lead to oral cancer.
And that’s all before heart disease, lung cancer or any other health effects kick in. Quitting is torturous and horrible, but so is dying from lung cancer or watching your children weep as they sit next to you in a hospital bed after your first heart attack. At least with quitting, the agony ends and then life’s a lot better. And you won’t have to look at those horrible pictures on your cigarette packs.
