Breast cancer risk tied to mother's hip size

Posted on Oct 8th 2007 1:20PM by Bethany Sanders

Filed Under: Womens Health, Diet & Weight Loss

We're routinely told that our own waist size can have an effect on our future health, but a recent study found that the width of your mother's hip may have something to do with your risk of developing breast cancer as well. By studying the records of over 6,000 Finnish women who gave birth between 1934 and 1944 (when hips were routinely measured before childbirth), researchers found that women of mothers who had wide, round hips were three times more likely to develop breast cancer later in life.

There's an excellent Q & A on the topic here that also helps explain why we all need not run out an measure our hips (it's not a circumference, you can't measure at home) or worry because our mothers had curvy figures. Wider hips are a sign of higher levels of estrogen, and exposure to estrogen in the womb may be the cause of this elevated risk. What this finding will do is help researchers focus in more on embryonic development and understand better how exposure in the womb relates to future disease.

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Tags: breast cancer, breast cancer prevention, breast cancer risk and hip size, BreastCancer, BreastCancerPrevention, BreastCancerRiskAndHipSize

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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 2)

snoweezoey 10-10-2007 @ 8:53PM

woah

Teresa 10-10-2007 @ 9:51PM

Amazing article considering yet another recent study out of Britain listed the top indicator of breast cancer as abortion.

Those who have an abortion greatly increase their risk of breast cancer. You see the breasts change during pregnancy and an abortion causes those changes to morph into abnormal cells after the abortion.

I know that keeping this quiet protects the abortion agenda but if they really are so concerned about women can't they tell them the truth?

Rose Rogan 10-10-2007 @ 10:32PM

What a crock........., teresa!! Please go someplace else to spread these lies and hysterical fears

jeanette 10-10-2007 @ 10:40PM

This thought had crossed my mind recently. I'm a breast cancer survivor, one of the lucky ones with zero history anywhere in the family, I've noticed many of the ladies I've done chemo with, or that I see at the docs office are "hippier" more pear shaped. I know that signifies a higher estrogen level usually. I'm more of an apple shape, carry my weight in my middle, have no hips or rear, and I haven't seen many with this shape. I thought it was just a fluke.

We believe my cancer came from exposure to carcinogens. I've worked industrial construction for many many years. Exposed to all sorts of stuff. Thats not something you really think about when you are 25 and raking in big bucks though..

RhiannonRings333 10-10-2007 @ 10:42PM

This is total BULLSH*T!!! I have known three women, young women, who have died from breast cancer and they NOR their mothers fit this catagory! Keep trying, though!!!

Lee 10-10-2007 @ 11:01PM

#2 Teresa, that is completely pathetic. Just a scare tactic. What women really need to do is be encouraged to breast-fed the infants they have to help regenerate the breast tissue instead of being given male hormone to "dry up" their milk so they bottle feed and buy formula.

Sarah 10-10-2007 @ 11:03PM

Wow, Rhiannonrings, this may come as a total shock to you, but your personal observation of 3 people does not equal a scientific study! That's why they're scientists and you're not! There are billions of people on this earth, not 3, and these things are usually followed for years, generations (study began in the '30's), not the span of your personal observational skills. Scientists have years of education, training, statistics with them, not knowing 3 people! People like you who make such idiotic comments on message boards make me crazy! Also, you, Teresa, this study was about hip-to-waist ratio (as that may deterrmine the effect of estrogen and body shape on breast cancer), not a social commentary on abortion. That is an entirely different study. When scientists (again, not you) release the findings of a study about a specific point, they are not likely to talk about another totally unrelated topic of someone else's findings in their study!

sarah 10-10-2007 @ 11:10PM

teresa, the ABC effect, the one you are referring to, was actually a total hoax-there was no real science to back up any of what it was saying. The entire "theory" was started by a group of anti'abortioners-it was proven that they had NO basis for their argument, nor any scientific data. Please research what you write about: it is because of people like you and those pro-life psychos that such rumors are propagated into society; there honestly is no link. I am not saying this because I am "pro-choice" or because I back the abortion industry; I am saying this because people made this up to make people stop having abortions. Besides, by the time the breasts start changing that much, the abortion would have already happened. The cells do not "morph" as you say, in the matter of a few months or weeks. It is ridiculous that anyone could accept that theory as real.

KAREN 10-10-2007 @ 11:23PM

I have lost 3 dear friends to breast cancer in the past 2 years. None of them had any history of cancer in their families. What they did have in common was that they all took synthetic hormones within the last five years. Today hormones are fed to animals we in turn eat on a daily basis. I'ts no wonder cancer is at an all time high.
I believe the only cure is education & to keep an open mind.

Christine 10-11-2007 @ 10:35AM

I am a survivor, and have had two abortions. Big fat hairy deal. I am alive. That's all I know. Hope you ladies have some fun in your lives.

Eve 10-11-2007 @ 9:10AM

Heart disease is still the number one killer of women over breast cancer. I realize this is Breast Cancer Awareness month, but I believe the hype about breast cancer is fear based due to women being more concerned about their appearance, losing a breast, than it is losing their life.

Susan 10-10-2007 @ 11:34PM

I had an abortion several years ago, and I do not, nor have I ever had breast cancer. I also have friends who had abortions and they do not have breast cancer either. I know women who did not have abortions, yet they developed breast cancer. So much for your "theory" Theresa.

Maggie 10-10-2007 @ 11:46PM

Abortion has nothing to do with breast cancer! If that were true then every woman who has ever been pregnant would be more at risk for breast cancer and we know that is not true! This is one of those myths that is promoted by the anti-choice groups. Being pregnant actually makes you less likely to have breast cancer.

ann 10-10-2007 @ 11:47PM

Okay, I usually don't make comments on these boards but after reading what #6 wrote (by Lee) I just had to make a comment.
FYI Lee, I breast fed SIX children (the first two for a year each and the last four for almost two years each), I do NOT have cancer in my family (NO one has it), I have NEVER smoked, I drink only twice a year (once on my birthday and once on my husband's...ONE mixed drink only on each), I am not over weight, have never worked in a high risk health area (I used to teach special ed children and have been a stay-at-home mom for the past ten years), and I walk four to eight miles per DAY...basically, I did all the 'right' things. Yet, on my husband's birthday just this past August, I was diagnosed with breast cancer and after several more tests it was determined that I had 'advanced metastatic breast cancer, stage 4' at the age of 38. The only way I even found out that I had cancer was after it had already spread into my lymph nodes under my left arm and I went to see my doctor about the lump it created there. They had to do a surgical biopsy to even find the cancer. And, fyi, it didn't show up on mammogram when they did one and it cannot be felt in my breast due to dense breast tissue (which, by the way, is normal in women my age).
So, please, Lee, do not tell other women that if you breast feed you will not get cancer because I certainly did. It may help and by no means should breast feeding be discouraged because it's the best way to feed your baby but it does NOT stop cancer...

zuli 10-11-2007 @ 12:11AM

i beg to differ. I come from a family of wide-hipped women and none have encountered breast cancer. Like most cancers, breast cancer is genetically connected. I is defenately in the genes. But, not in the wide hip "jean". lol

Sarah 10-11-2007 @ 1:05AM

again, Zuli, your own personal experience is NOT a scientific study. Do any of you people even know what that is? Did you even go to college and study statistics? These studies were done by research doctors, not people who once knew someone who... etc, etc. You can't read this stuff and then say, "Oh, that's not true because I once knew 2 people who..." That is not a scientific study. For something to be STATISTICALLY SIGNIFICANT (and thus, prove or disprove a theory), they have to look at large numbers of people and find a LOT of whatever!

imchantin 10-11-2007 @ 1:17AM

There are soo many experts out there, they are all guessing. Could it be that people's stinking thinking can cause Cancer? I know that this is so.

fantasticron 10-17-2007 @ 2:28AM

Bethany Sanders, I think you should, at least for an hour, sit next to someone who is crotcheting something that isn't there. Maybe then you can take our breath away with your wildly obnoxious and biased statements.

PO man 10-11-2007 @ 1:25AM

You know sure breast cancer is a shame really, but here's a fact for you...
33% thats 1/3 of the entire male population will develop Prostrate cancer. 25% of them will die from it due to poor screening for it or it being detected to late. of the surviors 90% develop uncontrolable bladders. another 5% of those surviors will develop other cancers from the radioactive pellet that right now is the best they can do for you outside of radical intrusiove abodominal surgery. There is roughly 10% of the amount of research dollars being spent on this cancer as there is on breast cancer. Yet more men die from this cancer then women have Breast Cancer.
It's time that Prostrate Cancer is taken seriously by this nation to the same levle as that of Breast Cancer.

Rikki 10-11-2007 @ 1:42AM

The verdict is still out regarding exactly how much an abortion may be one of many contributing factors to breast cancer later in life. But there is evidence to consider if you have an open mind:

http://www.abortionbreastcancer.com/

http://www.jpands.org/vol8no2/malec.pdf