To reduce the chances
of getting cancer, additional general actions are worthy of consideration: (1)
Improve the diet and living environment, (2) Improve the physical status, (3)
Improve the mental status, and (4) Follow nature’s rules.
Improve Your Diet and Living Environment
Although anything we eat needs to go through the gastrointestinal
track and will be digested before being absorbed and utilized by the body, it
is probably true that we are what we eat.
It is not surprising that eating too much fatty food tend to make people
fat. Many reports showed that people on
high-fat and low-fiber diet tend to have a high probability of getting colon
cancer. It is well known that fruits and
vegetables contain a lot of phytochemicals which are associated with
antioxidant and anticancer activities. It is
also not surprising that air pollution and smoking tend to increase the chances
for people to get lung cancer.
Improve Your Physical Status
Do
regular exercise to keep your body in good shape. A physically healthy body means all body
components are functioning in coordination according to nature’s rules. If this is the case, there will be a lower
probability for normal cells to be accidentally changed into cancer cells.
According
to a scientific article published by British Journal of Sports Medicine in
2009, men with leisure-time physical activity of more than 5.2 METs (metabolic
equivalents) had a lower risk of cancer death as compared with man whose mean
intensity of physical activity was less than 3.7 METs (lowest quartile).
Improve Your Mental Status
Emotion
and health are very closely related.
Mental status affects cytokines (down-regulation or up-regulation) which
are related to many health issues. In
our daily lives, we are often under all kinds of emotion. The bad news is that it has been reported
that negative emotions are associated with poorer health. However, the good news is that positive
emotions are associated with good health.
One specific example is that positive emotions lower elevated levels of
inflammatory cytokines, such as interleukin 6 (IL-6).
Although
there is no solid evidence showing that stress is directly related to the
occurrence of cancer, many studies did show that stress can produce a
micro-environment that is more favorable to cancer growth.
Follow Nature’s Rules
What
parameters are important in complying with the rules of nature? These include circadian rhythm, nutrition,
air, water, temperature, exercise, chemicals, viruses, bacteria, and other
environmental factors. Examples will be presented in the upcoming sections.
© Jiajiu Shaw, 2017
Disclaimer: This blog is written solely for informational purposes. It does not constitute the practice of any medical, nursing or other medical professional health care advice, diagnosis, or treatment. All contents posted are extracted from the book I wrote, "IS CANCER IN US", published recently.
