View Full Version : Health anxiety from this article?
I was reading this CNN article that has made my anxiety even worse. The article talks about how cancer is just bad luck more than anything else. I'm wondering if the studies, the numbers, and percentages are true or accurate. It makes me anxious cuz I eat very clean and workout a lot for the purpose of trying to prevent disease and cancer, but this article has completely destroyed what I had thought. Also I had abdominal Ct scan at age 21 and a couple abdominal x rays. I got heavy doses of radiation on top of me smoking cigarettes and weed for 3 years when I got hose tests.radiation plus carcinogens from smoking equals bad luck for me. I feel like I'm screwed. I'm not trying to scare anyone either.
Article here:
http://www.cnn.com/2017/03/23/health/cancer-mutations-bad-luck-study/index.html
ServerError
23-03-17, 21:31
Not even gonna read the article. Personally, I'm not remotely concerned about what it might say. None of us can go back and change what happened. From the sounds of it, you're living a healthy life. That's all that matters. Anything else is like chasing the breeze and can only lead you down a miserable path. Imagine making it into your 90s having wasted decades on this fear. You could quite possibly make it to that age. And then you'd look back and wonder why you wasted so much of your young and active years with worry about things you can't change and probably didn't matter anyway.
Just try to ignore it. Sounds like you are doing all you can to live a healthy clean life. It's what most doctor's would like to hear to give you best chances of avoiding illness. I wouldn't worry about a few years smoking & xrays.
I can't say it any better then Servererror but ( easier said than done) I wouldn't worry:) xx
It's funny, I read that this morning and thought... Hmmm... I wonder who's going to post about it? ;)
Life is essentially a crap shoot. That's the way it is. Whether it's an illness, an accident or plain old natural causes, it's going to end sometime.
The key is to enjoy it while you can. The more time you waste worrying about the "what ifs" the less time you have to enjoy living.
Get help. Learn to live with the "what ifs" and hopefully you'll live a long and happy life.
Positive thoughts
Fishmanpa is right, it's about chance and no necessary risk factors.
My Nan smoked for 50 years on and off and so did her husband she is 95 and my grandad died at 84.
I think a good diet does wonders, home cooked food is the key my nan rarely ate out.
Thank you for you input. I agree I must stop worrying so much about health. The key to a happy life is to realize you are never actually in control I guess.
Also I just watched a video on YouTube by John Oliver about scientific studies that has made me question every single scientific study that has ever came out about health, cancer, etc... Very interesting video and has honestly helped me feel a lot better and has helped with my anxiety. I'm very happy I watched this video today as it has helped me dismiss the article I posted above.
https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=0Rnq1NpHdmw
I read that article and it is based on research conducted by reputable researchers. I don't understand why it is causing you so much angst. If anything it should reduce your anxiety about smoking and CT Scans etc. The research shows that smoking, obsesity and other poor behavioural habits do not contribute to developing cancer to the degree that was originally believed. So doesn't that make you feel better? It should. If, however, you want to believe that if you make all the right lifestyle choices you will never develop cancer then you must have been living under a rock all your life. What about the millions of people who developed cancer even though they have lived a healthy life? The fact is that you don't have to do anything wrong to develop cancer. In addition to that, the researchers aren't suggesting that you may as well go out and smoke, drink and eat excessively. Remember that study only looked at risk of cancer from poor lifestyle habits. It didn't look at heart disease and other illnesses that poor behavioural habits contribute to. Also as the researchers state, the findings are important to all those people who have led a healthy life and developed cancer anyway, including parents of children who have developed cancer. Instead of believing that it is something they have done wrong eg passing on a bad gene to their offspring they can now know that it is more about bad luck than anything else.
MyNameIsTerry
25-03-17, 05:26
Not the best article but then I guess that's more because it ye research it's covering. As the other doctor quoted said "it told me nothing I haven't known for twenty years".
Bad luck is a pretty poor term to use. Perhaps "shit happens" might be better? :yesyes:
This research just shows that a large number of cancer cases are causes by DNA mutations. DNA replicates millions of times a day. Some of these go wrong but they are not often in areas with cancer links.
The researcher stated that a third mutation is needed to create the cancerous growth. But guess what? They make no mention of what causes that in the article. :doh: They only mention smoking as an example of higher levels of mutation.
They don't talk about living a healthy life therefore they are also don't prove it helps. But here's the interesting point to me - they don't state what causes the third mutation therefore they don't know AND what if living a healthy life is preventing that third mutation from occurring?
Something interesting is epigenetics which explains DNA is changing through our lives based on the conditions we are applying. The methylation process is influenced by our health and there are studies of this beyond cancer research. Newer cancer drugs are coming out that exploit the methylation process to reverse cancerous growth.
So, what if we lead a crap lifestyle? Do we create a mechanism that can influence this methylation?
Who knows? The guys who did this research clearly don't. And as the other doctor commenting points out, it's a statistical analysis NOT clinical research. The phrase "correlation doesn't equal causation" springs to mind.
But listen to the top doc downplaying it from your cancer research society:
"I was concerned about the last article, because it didn't talk enough about prevention and it left people thinking, 'Gee you're just destined to get cancer and you can't do anything about it,'" said Dr. Otis Brawley, chief medical officer of the American Cancer Society. Brawley, who was not involved in the research said he was "much happier" with the current paper, even if it "doesn't tell me anything I hadn't known for the last 20 years."
Can burnt toast and roasted potatoes cause cancer?
Can burnt toast and roasted potatoes cause cancer?
"Bert Vogelstein is an incredibly well-respected, well-known cancer biologist who published a paper very similar to this -- you might even call it part one of this paper -- two years ago," said Brawley, explaining the original paper caused "quite a stir" because it implied that "almost all cancers were not preventable."
"And it really upset the anti-smoking people, it upset the folks who are in the nutrition and physical activity for cancer prevention -- he really upset the prevention crowd," said Brawley, who believes the new paper is generally a better explanation of the original theory.
"Keep in mind it's a mathematical simulation, it's not a clinical trial, but [Vogelstein is] noting that a certain number of cases are due to replication error, DNA replication error, in normal growth," said Brawley. "Those are cancers we really cannot do a lot to prevent."
The research really doesn't provide anything more than an angle for new research. The question is what causes that third mutation. Until they answer that, I'll file this in my "may never go anywhere" tray.
---------- Post added at 05:26 ---------- Previous post was at 04:23 ----------
Here is The Daily Mail covering it. I'm sure of what the response would be if the OP linked to them but the funny thing is, they did a better job of explaining the research than CNN. The latter chose to commit more time to the doctor downplaying it, which I find interesting.
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2893932/Most-cancers-caused-bad-luck-not-lifestyle-Scientists-claim-65-cases-random-mistakes-genes-about.html
The article in Nature explains that the 66% is an average across the cancers they researched and there was this useful point:
Vogelstein counters that the study never intended to challenge efforts to combat known causes of cancer, such as cigarette smoking and sun exposure, which can create cancer-causing mutations. Epidemiological studies suggest that about 42% of cancers are preventable, he says, and his results do not contradict that. (Because his study looks at the number of cancer-causing mutations — and it typically takes more than one such mutation to cause cancer — the numbers are not directly comparable.)
And living longer meant more mutations. Which is another way of saying more exposure leads to greater risk for any factors we can choose to reduce. A "no shit Sherlock" seems relevant at this point! :doh:
Regardless of your opinion of the research it still has merit. The researchers are not some bogus pair of hacks. If nothing else it provides those people whose children have developed cancer a certain amount of comfort. I would rather believe that my child's cancer was a random event rather than something I contributed to in some way. Of course, I would rather not have to deal with that kind of devastation at all. The fact remains that millions of people develop cancer regardless of how healthy a lifestyle they lead. So from my perspective the researchers are saying that more research is needed into gene mutations. I agree with them.
---------- Post added at 16:19 ---------- Previous post was at 16:14 ----------
Also regarding the guy in the link John Oliver. I'm not familiar with him but I don't think he is implying that all scientific research is rubbish. From the little I now kow of him he is cynical about how the media chooses to present scientific research. No one is stupid enough to believe that scientific research is rubbish.
I read this too and I found it weird that they didn't make mention of what increases mutations on the genome like short telemeres from high calorie intake and lack of excercise. They were quite vague and made it seem as though science has no idea what shortens DNA repair networks when they have proven lifestyle choices do.
MyNameIsTerry
25-03-17, 07:48
Regardless of your opinion of the research it still has merit. The researchers are not some bogus pair of hacks. If nothing else it provides those people whose children have developed cancer a certain amount of comfort. I would rather believe that my child's cancer was a random event rather than something I contributed to in some way. Of course, I would rather not have to deal with that kind of devastation at all. The fact remains that millions of people develop cancer regardless of how healthy a lifestyle they lead. So from my perspective the researchers are saying that more research is needed into gene mutations. I agree with them.
---------- Post added at 16:19 ---------- Previous post was at 16:14 ----------
Also regarding the guy in the link John Oliver. I'm not familiar with him but I don't think he is implying that all scientific research is rubbish. From the little I now kow of him he is cynical about how the media chooses to present scientific research. No one is stupid enough to believe that scientific research is rubbish.
It's useful in that it provides a point for further research, other than that it provides little worthwhile insight into any cause other than to say they don't know so it's "bad luck" yet they fail to rule out anything that causes these mutations so how are we too know what this even means?
I never said they were bogus or hacks but my opinion is that this is poor in terms of telling us anything because they just haven't found any cause. They've looked for statistical correlation.
John Oliver? I quoted Brawley from the American Cancer Society, is Oliver from the other link? None of them imply these guys are poor but the first study, this is the follow up, was criticised for it's vagueness. Brawley is supportive of this later follow up.
I can understand the usefulness for parents but beyond that, there is little value in telling a cancer patient "we don't know, it's just your bad luck".
Millions of people who are healthy get cancer. But by healthy we mean those who aren't suffering illness or smoke or are obese? Just how healthy are they though? How many of us are looking after ourselves to prevent cancer? This point is always open to assumption so unless they work out just how healthy they kept themselves, we have a large number with a lot of variation. More work is definitely needed.
It's your opinion, of which we are both entitled, mine is that this isn't ground breaking. When they explain what is causing these mutations, it will be much more interesting.
When I read the CNN article it had me wondering if it was just a poor right up and that was why so little appears to have been found to be useful in that bad luck category. With not reading the actual paper, that may be the case.
People (such as my husband who is a scientist) will argue that science is very transparent and they only publish information so it can be built upon and explored further. The only problem with that is the majority of the population are not scientists, therefore articles like this one are quite dangerous when read by the general public. Some people will interpret this as a free pass to live without care of how the body is treated. I still think there were so many variables not touched upon in the article like 2nd and 3rd degree effects. Like that "bad luck" mutation being switched on. Everything in life has cause and effect, this is a first rule of physics. Maybe the researchers just mean the direct first degree effect on the mutation is not clear at the moment? Random things do happen yes, but the odds can certainly be swayed in your favour ( I believe anyway) but maybe this is my control mechanism talking? I like to think not.
No one is saying go out and smoke, drink and eat to your heart's content. The authors aren't saying that either. They acknowledge that lifestyle choices have an impact on your chances of developing cancer. I agree with you Terry that it informs further research and as you say that is probably the most useful aspect of the paper.
To the OP I'm not sure why you need to believe that there is no truth in the research. A big part of overcoming HA is reaching the point where you acknowledge that you can't control everything to do with your health. My mother was an extremely healthy woman. She didn't drink or smoke and she was very active. Still she died from an enlarged heart that was caused by a virus. She did nothing wrong.
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