The connection between lifestyle and cancer

Malignant melanoma, for instance, takes more lives than traffic accidents and can in many cases be avoided... 

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  Cancer – most Swedes are not aware about the connection between cancer and the way they live their lives. Above: The pink ribbon, the symbol for breast cancer awareness.

• New study reveals: Many don’t know how to prevent cancer.

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  Photo: hjart-lungfonden.se

• Many Swedes don’t know how to prevent cancer. There’s clear evidence that there’s a connection between your lifestyle and cancer, the strongest ones are the connections between smoking and cancer and tanning and cancer. But there are others as well, and those Swedes don’t seem as aware of.
  Every other Swede, for instance, doesn’t know there’s a connection between obesity and cancer, as well as high alcohol consumption and the risk of getting cancer.

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  Photo: halsa.se

• All according to a new study made by Sifo (a company in the area of opinion and social research) on behalf of the Cancerfonden (the Swedish Cancer Society). Many of the risk factors go hand in hand with a destructive lifestyle.

• “If you smoke a lot, you oftentimes also drink too much, exercise too little and eat the wrong types of food,” says Lars-Gunnar Ericson, at the press department at Cancerfonden. With the research that exists today, the most effective advice is to quit smoking and take it easy on the sun-tanning. Another advice is to take early signs of cancer seriously and see a doctor immediately.

• “Malignant melanoma, for instance, takes more lives than traffic accidents,” Ericson says. “But if you get the diagnosis early, you can fix it.” Yet, it’s important to not worry unnecessarily. Heart palpitations don’t mean cancer, which nearly one in four in the study thought. Symptoms of cancer include: Bumps on your body, such as in the armpits and groins, in the breasts and on your throat. Bleeding without a cause, such as coughing up blood, blood in urine and feces. Birthmarks that change. Inexplicable wounds that won’t heal. Prolonged coughing or being hoarse without having a cold or an infection. Prolonged diarrhea or diarrhea without a known cause. Problems swallowing without a throat infection. Prolonged fever without a known cause. Decreased appetite or weight loss without a known cause. Symptoms from the nervous system, like prolonged pain or fumbling with unknown cause.