Posted on 09/26/2005 11:26:20 PM PDT by nickcarraway
A new study published in the British Medical Journal, has revealed that left handed women are more at a risk of breast cancer.
Researchers in the Netherlands examined the relation between handedness and incidence of breast cancer in over 12,000 healthy, middle aged women born between 1932 and 1941.
Body measurements were taken and risk factors such as social and economic status, smoking habits, family history of breast cancer, and reproductive history were recorded.
They found that left handed women were more than twice as likely to develop premenopausal breast cancer as non-left handed women. Adjusting for risk factors hardly affected the overall association.
The origin of the association may lie in exposure to high levels of sex hormones before birth, which can induce left handedness as well as changes in breast tissue, say the authors.
"Although the underlying mechanisms remain elusive, our results support the hypothesis that left handedness is related to increased risk of breast cancer," they concluded.
Crap. I'm ambidextrious, I'm screwed.
Best laugh of the night.
Wow. wouldn't it be great if they could come up with a less awkward term for these people. Perhaps "right handed" would work.
Ha ha. Well, glad to amuse. :)
There I was, minding my own business, reading FR in the middle of the night, drinking a beer and then that.......now the monitor, keyboard and dog need a bath, thanks for nothing ;).
Left-handed people born before the 1960s were often trained to be right-handed. That makes these right/left studies dubious.
Sorry. Aside from being a leftie/rightie, I also am a middle kid. So, the smart ass really comes through. :) I hope you have some screen wipes.
Maybe the women who participated in the study did not have right hands?
My friend and her mom are both naturally left-handed, but her mom was made to write right-handed in school. It's weird to see her mom write, because she still turns the paper and all that.
I wrote ambidextriously until I was in 2nd or 3rd grade, and then my teacher made me pick a hand to write with. I went with my left, because it seemed a little more comfortable. No one ever tried to make me right-handed though.
I still bat, putt, bowl, throw, etc. with both hands. I used to have two mitts as a kid, because I could never remember which was my throwing hand. :)
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