New research suggests that if girls and young women exercise regularly it may cut their risk of breast cancer before the menopause by up to a quarter.

A massive new study of nearly 65,000 women published in the Journal of the National Cancer Institute and carried out by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St Louis and Harvard University in Boston, showed that keeping active can help protect against developing the disease before the age of 50, compared to those who are less active.

 

It seems that high levels of activity between the ages of 12 to 22 offer the most protection. The study which is the largest of its kind found that most active women were running or doing around three hours of exercise a week, with the total amount of exercise they did more important than the type of exercise they did or its intensity. It is thought that exercise can help lower breast cancer risk because it lowers levels of the hormone oestrogen which is known to increase breast cancer risk.

Dieters who eat similar amounts have the best chances of losing weight, according to research presented in Dublin at the annual conference of the British Psychological Society. Those who starve one day so they can indulge the next are on the road to diet disaster.

A study of dieters who ate an identical or similar number of calories every day were less tempted to comfort eat because their self-esteem was higher. However, those who binged one day and starved the next had lower self-esteem and were more likely to comfort eat. The study shows that if a dieter can stay consistent in their calorie intake every day their body image improves and it is more likely that they will lose weight. Previous studies have also shown that those who keep a food journal or make a note of what they’ve eaten each day lose three times as much weight as those who don’t record their food intake. Finally, exercise is also an important part of the weight loss equation. Earlier this year a study of thousands of dieters from the US showed that those who exercised regularly for 60 minutes a day were more likely to stay trim.

Keeping fit by jogging or cycling in middle age and beyond slows and reverses the decline in muscle power, balance and coordination in later life, according to a study published in the April edition of the British Journal of Sports Medicine.

Women begin to lose fitness around the age of 35, with aerobic power falling by up to a half by the age of 60. This loss of fitness can make everyday activities exhausting but regular cardiovascular exercise which strengthens the heart and lungs can compensate for the fall in the body’s ability to use oxygen and generate energy that typically occurs in middle age. Reviewing previous studies on the benefits of regular exercise in middle age and beyond the research team came to the conclusion that a regular exercise programme can slow or reverse the loss of aerobic fitness and this in turn reduces the individual’s biological age. The Government advises that people exercise five times a week for 30 minutes or more and the level of exertion should be enough to raise heart beat to 120 beats a minute or higher, so brisk walking, gardening, housework, dancing and swimming are all recommended. Other evidence shows that regular exercise can ease symptoms of the menopause, boost weight loss and cut the risk of a range of health problems including obesity, diabetes, heart disease and depression.