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Dietary “phytoestrogens” — plant substances that have weak estrogen-like activity — have little impact on the risks of developing hormone-sensitive cancers like breast and prostate cancer or colorectal cancers, new research suggests.

In a large study of some 25,000 British adults, researchers failed to find any “significant” differences in cancer risk related to dietary intake of these compounds.

Phytoestrogens are found in a wide range of foods including dairy products, soy foods, cereals, fruits, vegetables, nuts, seeds, coffee and tea. Previous studies have suggested dietary phytoestrogen intake is associated with increased breast cancer risk and reduced colorectal cancer risk in women. The results from earlier studies were hampered, however, by limited data about phytoestrogen content in food.

No previous research has examined the association between phytoestrogen intake and prostate cancer risk.

In the current study, reported in the American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, researchers assigned phytoestrogen values to nearly 11,000 foods following chemical analyses. For the first time, phytoestrogen values were assigned to animal products.

Unlike plants, which themselves contain phytoestrogens, phytoestrogens are generated by the digestion of animal products like meat and dairy products by microbes in the gut, the researchers explain.

Phytoestrogen consumption was estimated for cancer-free adult participants in the European Prospective Investigation into Cancer and Nutrition – Norfolk (EPIC-Norfolk). EPIC-Norfolk participants, recruited between 1993 and 1997, filled out a diet diary for a week and provided information about age, height, weight, smoking, aspirin use, menopausal status, and family history of cancer among other things.

Cancers that developed within 12 months of study recruitment were identified from a cancer registry totaling 244 breast cancers, 221 colorectal cancers, and 204 prostate cancers. The diets and other relevant information from those who developed cancer were compared to information from other participants (controls) who did not develop cancer.

While acknowledging more study is needed, the authors concluded that there is “little evidence” that phytoestrogen intake is “associated with subsequent risk of breast or prostate cancer.”

However, phytoestrogens found in eggs and dairy products “may influence the risk of prostate cancer and colon cancer in women,” they report.

The associations are weak and without further study do not warrant changes in diet, lead investigator Heather Ward, of the MRC Center for Nutrition and Cancer in the Department of Public Health and Primary Care at Strangeways Research Laboratory in Cambridge, England, told Reuters Health.

“The results of the present study do not suggest that anyone should alter their phytoestrogen intake, in part because the majority of the associations between phytoestrogen intake and cancer risk were not significant,” the doctoral candidate wrote in an email.

“It is worth noting that phytoestrogen intake within an Asian-style diet is more than ten-fold greater than in Western diets, without evidence of an increase in cancer risk,” she added.

Because phytoestrogen consumption is on the rise in Britain, the authors urge further monitoring because “the relation between phytoestrogen and cancer may change over time.”

The risk that an untrained bystander can do harm by giving cardiopulmonary resuscitation, or CPR, to someone who collapses in public is almost vanishingly small, a new study indicates.

And so the dispatchers who send emergency medical help when 911 is called should routinely tell the caller to start CPR, said Dr. Thomas D. Rea, an associate professor of medicine at the University of Washington, and lead author of a report in the Dec. 21 online issue of Circulation.

“There have been concerns expressed by laypeople and dispatchers that doing CPR might cause damage,” Rea said. “Our study shows that you can help the person at risk and the chances that you can injure someone who is not in cardiac arrest are very, very small, and those injuries are not serious.”

Rea and his colleagues used data on 1,700 adults who received CPR in the King County emergency response system between June 2004 and January 2007. Rea is program medical director of the King County program. Of those, 55 percent were in cardiac arrest and 45 percent were not. Nearly half of those not in cardiac arrest received CPR from bystanders.

The data showed minor problems — discomfort or injuries in 9 percent to 11 percent of cases — but only four fractures, three due to chest compressions administered during CPR, one from repositioning the individual for CPR.

And while this study did not measure the benefits of giving CPR even when it eventually turned out to be unnecessary, “many studies have shown that the odds of surviving cardiac arrest increase by 20, 30, 100 percent, depending on what study you look at, when CPR is given,” Rea said.

“The key finding here is that when a well-meaning member of the general public starts CPR and the victim is not in cardiac arrest, it will probably cause no injury at all,” said Dr. Michael Sayre, an associate professor of emergency medicine at Ohio State University, and a spokesman for the American Heart Association. “The study reassures me that rescuers are rarely going to do any kind of injury.”

King County emergency dispatchers use a basic two-question format to determine whether CPR should be started: Is the person conscious? Is the person breathing normally?

“If the answers are ‘no,’ the dispatcher tells the caller to ‘get the victim on a hard surface, on his back, bare the chest, put the hands in the center of the chest right between the nipples and then start compressions of one to two inches, counting aloud,’” Rea said. The dispatcher counts along with the CPR giver, and the routine continues until the emergency response team arrives.

It can end sooner if the person getting CPR regains consciousness and tells the rescuer to stop.

King County is unusually well organized to handle cardiac emergencies, Sayre said. “My experience is that in many places, the 911 center is almost too polite,” he said. “In communities like King County, call-takers are aggressive about telling callers how to do CPR.”

There often is uncertainty at the caller’s end of the telephone encounter, Sayre said. “I know there can be hesitation in terms of training and doing it in person. But this shows that evaluating the situation quickly and starting CPR will rarely do any harm.”

Some diseases and conditions can impact on your entire body, from your head to your feet.

The American Podiatric Medical Association lists these health conditions that can lead to foot problems or indicate that a foot problem exists:
High blood pressure.
Cardiovascular disease.
Rheumatic heart disease.
Diabetes, particularly if you’re taking medication to manage it.
Open sores that don’t heal normally.
Swollen feet or a “burning” sensation in the feet.