By Vera Viner
The Breast Health and Healing Foundation is one of the first organizations that has emphasized the need for breast cancer prevention – as in, stopping cancer development before it starts. Many breast cancer communities, however, are still solely focused on early diagnosis and treatment. The severity of some cancer treatments are no joke – they can cause some serious side effects.
A new study stemming from New York University shows the calculated risks of cardiac disease for breast cancer patients undergoing radiation therapy. Patients who received left-sided radiotherapy while lying on their back had the highest risk of heart disease – a rise of 3.52 percent. Patients who underwent right-sided radiation therapy had the lowest risk.
David J. Brenner and his team from NYU studied 48 patients who underwent radiation therapy and hypothesized a 20-year cardiac disease risk. Their work is currently published in the JAMA Internal Medicine journal. The patients were diagnosed with stage 0 through stage IIA breast cancer.
Past research shows that breast cancer patients have a slightly higher risk of developing heart disease within five years after treatment, according to Medical News Today. The researchers from NYU looked at five characteristics to determine future likelihood of cardiac disease. These are:
1) Side of the body that received radiation therapy
2) The body position (lying up or down during treatment)
3) The average cardiac radiation dose
4) Coronary occurrences caused by radiation therapy
5) Cardiac risk for each patient (cholesterol levels, smoking, and hypertension)
The researchers found that when the heart is near the area of radiation (when women are lying with their head up and receiving radiation on the left side), the risk for heart disease increases. Those who received radiation on the right side were mostly safe from any significant increase in cardiac disease incidence.
“Because the effects of radiation exposure on cardiac disease risk seem to be multiplicative, the highest absolute radiation exposure risks correspond to the highest baseline cardiac risk,” the researchers wrote in their report. “Consequently, radiotherapy-induced risks of major coronary events are likely to be reduced in these patients by targeting baseline cardiac risk factors (cholesterol, smoking, hypertension), by lifestyle modification, and/or by pharmacological treatment.”
Better yet, you should start targeting these risk factors before being diagnosed with any serious disease. Instead of going through breast cancer treatments filled with a slew of side effects, it is important to never smoke, drink moderately (less than one glass per day), exercise regularly, eat a plant-based diet filled with whole grains, and avoid hormone replacement therapy. Prevention is key. Pass it on.
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