Fewer people in the U.S. are getting colorectal cancer (CRC), but that progress is seen much more often in well-off and highly educated Americans. In fact, the gap is widening in rate of colorectal deaths in people with less education and/or who live in deeply disadvantaged communities.

Researchers now have shown that differences in weight, diet and physical activity play a huge role in the higher rates and deaths from CRC among people of lower socioeconomic status.

In a paper published in the Sept. 4 2012 Journal of the National Cancer Institute, a careful statistical analysis of  a 10-year observational study of a half-million people indicated that helping people of lower education or income to change their diet, body weight, smoking and physical activity could be nearly as important as improved screening for reducing CRC deaths. Read the rest of this entry »

Making those New Year’s Resolutions?

You can do a lot to prevent colon and rectal cancer this year . . . and in the future.

Number One Resolution — Be screened for colorectal cancer if you are 50 or over, earlier if you are at higher risk. Read the rest of this entry »

Colorectal Cancer News in a Nutshell

Summer’s over. The black squirrels in the front yard are scurrying around hunting acorns and my inbox is full of neat nuggets of colorectal cancer news — and I don’t want to leave them buried all winter.

So here they are in brief.  You can check the links for more details.

Mixed Results Using Acupuncture for Radiation Nausea

The good news is that almost all patients felt they had less nausea after either real or sham acupuncture to manage nausea and vomiting during radiation therapy.  Nine out of ten wanted more treatments. Read the rest of this entry »

Are you done — or almost done — with your treatment for colon cancer?

Will you help answer a question about how to help colon cancer survivors  increase their physical activity?

You’ll learn more about colon cancer and may be randomly assigned to a special interactive program that is designed to help recovering colon cancer patients develop a healthy lifestyle.

The Survivorship Comprehensive Health Enhancement Support System (CHESS) study is available in centers in Wisconsin, Texas, North Carolina, and Connecticut.  To be part of the research, you need to have completed treatment for stage I, II, or III colon cancer within the past 12 months.  Read the rest of this entry »

Think twice about that second holiday cookie

Just in time for holiday indulging, a Danish study of 55,000 middle-aged men and women monitored for an average of 10 years showed a clear association between healthy lifestyle and a lower risk of developing colorectal cancer, according to a study published in a recent British Medical Journal.

“Colorectal cancer is predominantly a disease of Westernized countries, indicating that components of a Western lifestyle may contribute to risk,” researchers wrote in the journal. Yet only three prospective studies had been done—in which people without cancer were monitored over a period of time to see who developed colorectal cancer, and how lifestyle actions compared in those who did and didn’t develop it. And the three previous studies used different lifestyle factors. This study was one of the first to study the impact of five basic healthy behaviors, rather than just one. Read the rest of this entry »