March 29, 2024

Making healthy choices, reducing your cancer risk

A new year often brings with it resolutions to make healthier choices. Learn the benefits of good nutrition, regular physical activity and staying at a healthy weight. Research shows that poor diet and physical inactivity are two key factors that can increase cancer risk. Incorporate these tips into a daily routine to be more active.

Fitting in fitness – simple steps add up

Did you know you benefit from even small amounts of moderate activity throughout the day? Regular physical activity is easier to fit in than you may realize and can significantly lower your lifetime risk for cancer and heart disease and diabetes, too. Find the American Cancer Society’s physical activity guidelines for adults and children below. These recommendations are based on the latest scientific information to help reduce the risk of developing cancer.

ACS physical activity guidelines for cancer prevention

Adults: Get at least 150 minutes of moderate intensity or 75 minutes of vigorous intensity activity each week (or a combination of these), preferably spread throughout the week.

Children and teens: Get at least 60 minutes of moderate or vigorous intensity activity each day, with vigorous activity on at least three days each week. Moderate activity is anything that makes you breath as hard as you do during a brisk walk. During moderate activities, you'll notice a slight increase in heart rate and breathing, but you may not break a sweat. Vigorous activities are performed at a higher intensity and generally use large muscle groups. They cause a noticeable increase in heart rate, faster breathing and sweating.

Active substitutions: Don't think you have time to add physical activity to your day? Consider simple substitutions. Think about how much time you spend sitting, versus being active. Are there ways to replace sitting with moving?

For instance:

• Use stairs rather than an elevator.

• Walk or bike to your destination.

• Exercise at lunch with your workmates, family or friends.

• Take a 20-minute exercise break at work to stretch or take a quick walk.

• Walk to visit co-workers instead of sending an email.

• Go dancing with your spouse or friends.

• Plan active vacations, rather than driving trips.

• Wear a pedometer every day to increase your daily number of steps.

• Join a sports or recreation team.

• Use a stationary bicycle or treadmill while watching TV.

No matter what kind of activity you choose, the important thing is to get moving. Try to look for opportunities to be active throughout your day.

For most Americans who do not use tobacco, the most important cancer risk factors that can be changed are body weight, diet and physical activity. The World Cancer Research Fund estimates about 20 percent of all cancers diagnosed in the U.S. are related to body fatness, physical inactivity, excess alcohol consumption or poor nutrition, and thus could be prevented.

Although our genes influence our risk of cancer, most of the difference in cancer risk between people is due to factors that are not inherited. Avoiding tobacco products, staying at a healthy weight, staying active throughout life and eating a healthy diet may greatly reduce a person’s lifetime risk of developing or dying from cancer. These same behaviors are also linked with a lower risk of developing heart disease and diabetes.

Although these healthy choices can be made by each of us, they may be helped or slowed by the social, physical, economic and regulatory environment in which we live. Community efforts are needed to create an environment that makes it easier for us to make healthy choices when it comes to diet and physical activity.

Schedule your screening tests today. Not sure what screenings are right for you? Go to cancer.org to learn more and talk to your doctor. Take action in 2019, and help reduce your risk of cancer.

Join the local community for the next Relay For Life of Southwest Iowa in September of 2019. More information to come on the 2019 date and event. Join the mission to attack cancer by going to www.relayforlife.org/southwestiowa. If you have questions, contact event co-chairs Dawn Loudon at 641-202-0146 or Stephanie Ayers at 641-202-4448. Like the Facebook page, "Relay For Life of Southwest Iowa."