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Frequent
alcohol consumption increases Cancer risk in
older women
Newswise —
Postmenopausal women consuming two or more
alcoholic beverages a day may double their
risk of endometrial cancer, suggests a study
led by researchers at the University of
Southern California (USC). The study will
appear in the International Journal of
Cancer, and is now available online.
“This is the first
prospective study to report a significant
association between alcohol and endometrial
cancer,” says Veronica Wendy Setiawan,
assistant professor of preventive medicine
at the Keck School of Medicine of USC.
“Previous studies have
shown that alcohol consumption has been
associated with higher levels of estrogens
in postmenopausal women, which could be the
mechanism by which daily alcohol intake
increases one’s risk of endometrial cancer.”
According to the
National Cancer Institute, endometrial
cancer is the most common cancer of the
female reproductive system. It accounts for
approximately six percent of all cancers in
women.
“It’s important for
women, especially postmenopausal women, to
know and understand the consequences of high
alcohol consumption. It does not affect just
the liver, but alcohol has been associated
with breast cancer and now endometrial
cancer,” continues Setiawan.
Researchers drew upon
data from the Multiethnic Cohort Study (MEC),
an epidemiological study of more than
215,000 people from Los Angeles and Hawaii
created in 1993 by Brian Henderson, M.D.,
dean of the Keck School of Medicine of USC,
and Laurence Kolonel, M.D., Ph.D. of the
University of Hawaii.
The study followed
41,574 postmenopausal African-American,
Japanese-American, Latina, Native-Hawaiian
and White women in Los Angeles and Hawaii
for an average of 8 years. Data on alcohol
intake and endometrial cancer risk factors
were obtained from a baseline questionnaire.
“This discovery is
important as it suggests that changes to
certain lifestyle choices may potentially
help alter risk of the disease,“ says
Henderson, the paper’s senior author.
“However, these findings are preliminary and
must be investigated further before any
recommendations about alcohol consumption
can be made.”
The study also found
that the association of alcohol intake and
endometrial cancer is stronger among lean
women than among overweight or obese
postmenopausal women.
“Our data suggest that
lean women may be more sensitive to modest
elevations in hormone levels resulting from
alcohol drinking than obese women who
already have high levels of estrogen and
therefore mask alcohol as an independent
risk factor,” concludes Setiawan. “Again,
this is all preliminary and more studies
with sufficient numbers of heavy drinkers
are needed to corroborate our finding.”
The National Institutes
of Health and the National Cancer Institute
provided funding for the study.
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