Maintaining a Healthy Weight
Maintaining a healthy weight is important for everyone, but even more so for breast cancer survivors. Being overweight and gaining weight after treatment ends have been linked to poorer survival and cancer recurrence [31-34]. Higher body weight may increase hormone levels and affect risk of recurrence [35,36].
Being overweight and gaining weight also increase the risk of other health problems, such as heart disease and diabetes. Regular physical activity and eating a healthy diet are the best ways to maintain a healthy weight. For more information on weight control and physical activity, visit the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute.
Eating a Healthy Diet
At this time, we do not fully understand how diet relates to survival after breast cancer. Although body weight and weight gain appear to be important to survival, studies on factors such as dietary fat have had mixed results [37-39]. Evidence from the Women's Intervention Nutrition Study found that reducing dietary fat intake may improve disease-free survival [38]. Women in this study who reduced their fat intake also lost weight, which may have played a role in their increased disease-free survival [38]. Other studies have shown no benefit of low dietary fat on survival after treatment [37,39]. At this time there are no dietary guidelines on fat intake for breast cancer survivors. However, it makes sense for survivors to follow the same healthy diet that is recommended for everyone [40]. This diet, outlined below, promotes overall health and may help protect against different types of cancer and other diseases.
- Maintain a healthy weight.
- Get at least five servings of fruits and vegetables every day.
- Choose whole grain foods more often.
- Cut down on "bad" fats (saturated and trans fats), and eat more "good" fats (polyunsaturated and monounsaturated fats, like olive and canola oil).
- Get enough vitamin D and calcium every day. For women and men ages 51 to 70, this means 10 mcg of vitamin D and 1200 mg of calcium.
- Take a daily multivitamin with 400 mcg of folic acid (often called folate on nutrition labels).
- If you drink, drink less than one drink of alcohol a day (for women and fewer than two drinks a day for men). Those who drink alcohol should try to get enough folic acid, either through a multivitamin or foods like oranges, orange juice, leafy green vegetables and fortified breakfast cereals.
- Limit red meat and processed meat.
Adapted from the American Cancer Society’s 2006 Nutrition and Physical Activity Guidelines [40] and Washington University School of Medicine's Siteman Cancer Center’s Your Disease Risk [41].
