Obesity is known to be associated with 33 types of cancer in men and women. The capability to conceive makes women possess a complex working mechanism of the body. The risks and complications are thus higher especially in postmenopausal women.
According to researchers at the University of Minnesota, Masonic Cancer Center, the risk of losing life from colon cancer is high among women with abnormal body weight after menopause. Results of their findings are published in the September 2010 issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention, a journal of the American Association for Cancer Research.
Knowledge Gained from the Research on Complications in Postmenopausal Women:
- 1,096 women diagnosed with colon cancer were part of a study which lasted over 20-years.
- Obese women with body mass index (BMI) factor of at least 30 had 45 percent higher mortality rate.
- Under-weight women with BMI less than 18.5 had 89 percent higher death rate when compared to people with normal BMI.
- Risk of colon cancer related deaths was found to be 30-40 percent in women with high waist-to-hip ratio.
- The exact mechanism behind the link between obesity and higher colon cancer related deaths in patients is yet to be discovered.
- The research however suggests that the physical disorder has direct biological effect on people with increased abdominal obesity.
- It is believed that higher hormone levels in these people can lead to the disease acquiring more aggressive form.
Why Hormone Therapy is Essential for Obese Postmenopausal Women?
- Researchers at the National Cancer Institute, Bethesda found that the risk of breast cancer is high in adult women with abnormal weight.
- This conclusion was drawn from women who did not under take hormone therapy after menopause.
- Results of the research study were published in October 2007 issue of Archives of Internal Medicine.
- The hormone estrogen is believed to accumulate in the fat cells of the body and promote the growth of cancer cells in the breasts.
- The same hormonal mechanism of estrogen was also associated with ovarian cancer risk in January 2009.
- In obese women who did not undertake hormonal therapy after menopause, the risk of developing ovarian cancer was found to be nearly 80 percent.
