Fight Breast Cancer at Every Meal

A healthy diet is as important for your breasts as it is for the rest of your body. These seven strategies may help ward off the disease.

1. Pump Up Your Produce
   Fruits and vegetables contain powerful antioxidants that help protect against all forms of cancer. Plus, they're low in calories, so loading up on them is an easy way to keep your weight in check. Studies have found that eating five servings of produce a day reduces the odds of a breast-cancer recurrence in women, especially when combined with daily exercise. Consuming more than that doesn't seem to have any additional preventive effect, according to a study published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. Your best bet, says the American Cancer Society's Marji McCullough, is to eat a wide variety of brightly colored produce. "That way you're more likely to get all the phytochemicals that are important to cancer prevention."

2. Cut the Fat
   Studies on dietary fat have been conflicting and inconclusive, but most experts say it's still wise to steer clear of saturated fat as much as possible.

3. Get Plenty of Calcium and Vitamin D
   This spring, a 10-year Harvard study found that premenopausal women who got 1,366 milligrams of calcium and 548 IU of vitamin D daily slashed their breast-cancer risk by a third, and their odds of getting invasive breast cancer by up to 69 percent.
   "This is a promising area of research," says McCullough, who recommends eating calcium-rich foods like lowfat dairy products, canned salmon, almonds, fortified orange juice, and leafy greens, or taking a 1,000- to 1,200-milligram calcium supplement. Although milk contains vitamin D, most yogurt and cheese do not. To get enough, you probably need a multi vitamin, or if you're taking a calcium supplement, choose one that also contains 800 to 1,000 IU of vitamin D.

4. Sprinkle Flaxseed on Your Cereal
   Flaxseed is a good source of lignans, compounds that may play a role in preventing estrogendependent cancers by inhibiting the development of tumors or slowing their rate of growth, according to McCullough. "Other sources of lignans include sunflower seeds, peanuts, cashews, rye bread, and strawberries."

5. Keep Cookouts to a Minimum
   A recent study from the University of North Carolina found that postmenopausal women who had consumed a lot of barbecued and smoked red meat or chicken over their lifetimes had a greater risk of developing breast cancer than those who ate less. "When you grill meat, the amino acids form compounds called heterocyclic amines, which are carcinogenic. They're especially concentrated in charred meat," says Rachel Zinaman, R.D., a nutritionist at Memorial Sloan- Kettering Cancer Center's Evelyn Lauder Breast Center. "Plus, when the fat drips on the heat source," she adds, "it forms polycyclic aromatic hydrocarbons, another cancer-causing compound that binds to the meat."
   If the barbecue grill is beckoning, protect yourself by marinating the meat first or cutting it into smaller chunks. These cook faster than larger pieces, which reduces the likelihood that carcinogenic chemicals will form.

6. Imbibe Intelligently
   That means stopping after that first mojito. "More than one daily drink increases your odds of developing breast cancer by 20 percent or more," says Zinaman. In a recent Norwegian study, those who had two or more drinks a day during the previous five years had an 82 percent greater chance of developing breast cancer than those who didn't drink at all. "Alcohol may raise estrogen levels and interfere with the body's ability to use folic acid, a B vitamin that's been linked to cancer prevention," she says.

7. Fill Up On Fiber
   A diet that's rich in fiber (30 or more grams a day) can halve the risk of breast cancer among premenopausal women, according to a new study from the University of Leeds in England. It makes sense, says Zinaman. "Fiber-rich foods contain antioxidants and phytochemicals that are thought to be protective."