Drinking May Raise Breast Cancer Risk

(HealthDay News) -- Alcohol, consumed even in small amounts, increases the risk of breast cancer and particularly estrogen-receptor and progesterone-receptor positive breast cancer, a new study shows.

The findings, expected to be presented Sunday at the annual meeting of the American Association for Cancer Research, in San Diego, are followed by a second study that found an association between breast cancer risk and two genes involved in alcohol metabolism.

Previous data has suggested that consuming alcohol ups the risk of breast cancer, although the precise mechanisms have not been clarified.

In some forms of breast cancer, malignant cells have receptors that render them sensitive to hormones such as estrogen. The first study aimed to see if the hormone receptor status of the tumor influenced the relationship between alcohol consumption and breast cancer risk.

In the study, a team led by Dr. Jasmine Lew of the U.S. National Cancer Institute followed more than 184,000 postmenopausal women for an average of seven years.

Those who had less than one drink a day had a 7 percent increased risk of breast cancer compared to teetotalers, the team reported. Women who drank one to two drinks a day had a 32 percent increased risk, and those who had three or more glasses of alcohol a day had up to a 51 percent increased risk.

But the risk was seen mostly in those 70 percent of tumors classified as estrogen receptor- and progesterone receptor-positive. Researchers suspect that alcohol may have an effect on breast cancer via an effect on estrogen.

The risk was similar whether women consumed primarily beer, wine or spirits, the NCI team noted.

The second study dug deeper into other possible mechanism by which alcohol consumption increases breast cancer risk.

"For years, we've known that there's an association between alcohol drinking and breast cancer risk, but nobody knows yet what the underlying biological mechanisms are," said Dr. Catalin Marian, lead author of the study and a research instructor in oncology at the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. "The logical step was to begin analyzing the alcohol metabolizing genes."

And indeed, two of these genes -- ADH1B and ADH1C -- were associated with a two-fold increase in breast cancer risk.

But the study does not prove a definite cause-and-effect link. "This is an association," Marian said. "This type of study is good for generating hypotheses. It's not a definite conclusion. It needs to be replicated by other studies to say for sure that what we found is there."

Another researcher urged caution in interpreting the results of both studies.

"These studies are too early for use in a clinical setting or to advance a public health message," said Dr. Peter Shields, co-author of the genetics study and deputy director of the Lombardi Comprehensive Cancer Center.

However, he added that the findings "really do advance science, and, with proper replication in other studies, then they may be highly clinically significant."

More information
There's more on breast cancer at the U.S. National Cancer Institute.

Health Tip: Caring for a Newborn's Umbilical Cord

(HealthDay News) - Once a newborn's umbilical cord is cut just after birth, the remaining piece needs proper care to prevent infection.

The American Pregnancy Association offers these suggestions:

• Keep the area around the cord clean. Ask your doctor what is recommended -- perhaps cleaning regularly with rubbing alcohol, or just water and a gentle cleanser.


• Make sure the cord area stays dry. Use a newborn diaper with an area cut out to expose the cord. Also, let your baby wear a short t-shirt and a diaper when possible to help air get to the area.


• Don't give your baby a full, submerged bath -- just a sponge bath -- until after the cord has fallen off.


• Never pick or pull at the remaining cord, but let it fall off on its own.

Weight-Loss Drug Fights Alcoholic Fatty Liver Disease

(HealthDay News) -- Mice given the weight-loss drug rimonabant became resistant to alcohol's fat-building effects in the liver, which suggests the medication may help fight alcoholic fatty liver in humans, says a U.S. study.

Alcoholism is the leading cause of liver disease in Western societies, according to background information in the study.

Rimonabant, which blocks cannabinoid receptors, is approved for weight loss in several European countries but has not been approved in the United States. Last June, a U.S. Food and Drug Administration panel recommended that rimonabant should not be given the FDA's blessing because of continuing concerns about increased risks for suicidal thoughts among some users.

In this latest study, the researchers found that mice fed a low-fat diet and ethanol showed an increase in the gene encoding the CB1 cannabinoid receptor and in liver levels of an endocannabinoid called 2-arachidonoylglycerol (2-AG). These mice developed fatty livers.

Another group of mice that received the same diet plus rimonabant did not differ from mice fed a control diet. And mice lacking CB1 receptors, either throughout the body or only in the liver, were protected from alcoholic fatty liver.

"What makes these findings particularly interesting from our perspective is that they may have practical implications," said study author George Kunos, of the U.S. National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. "Treatment of animals with a [cannabinoid receptor] antagonist largely prevented alcohol's effect. It suggests that the development of fatty liver in those who use alcohol could be interfered with, or perhaps reversed, with such treatment."

The findings were published in the March issue of Cell Metabolism.

"Although alcoholic fatty liver is reversible in the early stages by cessation of drinking, this is often not feasible," the study authors wrote. "The present findings suggest that treatment with a CB1 antagonist may slow the development of fatty liver and thus prevent its progression to more severe and irreversible forms of liver disease."

Drugs that selectively act on CB1 receptors found outside of the brain might help fight fatty liver with less risk of side effects such as anxiety and depression, they said.

"Rimonabant has recently been introduced in Europe for the treatment of visceral obesity and the metabolic syndrome, which themselves are known risk factors for [liver disease]. Clinical trials testing the effectiveness of CB1 receptor blockers in the treatment of both alcoholic and nonalcoholic fatty liver and their more severe sequelae may be warranted," the researchers concluded.

More information
The American Liver Foundation has more about fatty liver.