New perspectives on health disparities in breast cance...(rse outcomes? Pham asked. Although many ...),Health

Obesity and risk for relapse of breast cancer in women of low socioeconomic status, Abstract no. A-34:

In one of the largest racially diverse studies of low income women, researchers found that women who are overweight or obese at the time they are diagnosed with breast cancer are at an increased risk of relapse.

Investigators from the Feist-Weiller Cancer Center at Louisiana State Health Science Center found that for each point gain of body mass index (BMI), the risk of cancer recurrence increased by four percent. For example, a breast cancer patient with a BMI of 30 had a 20 percent greater risk of relapse than a patient with a BMI below 25. (A BMI of 25-30 is considered overweight, and a BMI of 30 or greater is classified as obese.)

Not only was this risk evident in postmenopausal women, the researchers say, but the risk was present in premenopausal women, too. We find that obesity, which is associated with poverty, is a significant factor in whether cancer recurs, said Amanda Sun, M.D., Ph.D., the studys lead investigator and oncologist at the Feist-Weiller Cancer Center. The good news is weight is potentially a controllable risk factor

The research team examined medical records for 349 women diagnosed with breast cancer from 1990 to 2004. Forty-five percent of participants were African-American, and the rest were Caucasian, making the study one of the largest with a high proportion of African-American breast cancer patients, Sun says. In this group, 25 percent lived in counties with high poverty rates; 20 percent of the patients received free health care; and 25 percent were enrolled in Medicaid.

Poverty is an
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