HealthDay Reporter
WEDNESDAY, Could 26, 2021 (HealthDay Information) — Average use of hair relaxers does not enhance a Black girl’s danger of breast cancer, in line with a brand new examine.
“Whereas there may be biologic plausibility that publicity to some parts contained in hair relaxers may enhance breast most cancers danger, the proof from epidemiologic research so far continues to be inconsistent,” mentioned lead creator Kimberly Bertrand, an epidemiologist and assistant professor at Boston College College of Drugs.
Whereas the general danger of breast most cancers is similar for Black ladies and white ladies in the US, Black ladies have greater charges of aggressive subtypes.
These embody estrogen receptor detrimental (ER-) tumors, that are identified at a youthful age and are extra lethal, in line with background notes on the examine.
Sure hair care merchandise, together with relaxers/straighteners, are used extra usually by Black ladies. These merchandise might include estrogens or endocrine-disrupting chemical compounds, however the hyperlink between their use and breast most cancers danger has been unclear.
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To study extra, researchers analyzed information from a significant U.S. examine of Black ladies’s well being launched in 1995.
They in contrast breast most cancers amongst ladies who reported reasonable or heavy use of hair relaxers to those that reported little or no use of the merchandise. The examine discovered no affiliation between hair relaxer use and general breast most cancers danger.
“General, our outcomes are usually reassuring: We discovered no clear proof that hair relaxer use is related to breast most cancers danger for most girls,” Bertrand mentioned in a college information launch.
She added that there was some proof, nevertheless, that the heaviest customers of lye-containing merchandise — those that used them no less than seven instances a 12 months for 15 or extra years — had a couple of 30% elevated danger of estrogen receptor constructive (ER+) breast most cancers.
Additional analysis is required to study extra in regards to the potential connection between the usage of sure hair relaxers and breast most cancers danger, Bertrand concluded.
The findings have been lately printed on-line within the journal Carcinogenesis.
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Extra info
The Environmental Working Group has extra on hair straighteners.
SOURCE: Boston College, information launch, Could 24, 2021
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