14 DAY TRIAL // Endometrial cancer is more common in women who consume sodas and other sugar-sweetened beverages than in those who do not partake in this habit, a new study suggests. The correlation was found to be strongest for women who have already reached menopause.
Researchers from the University of Minnesota in Minneapolis found that this habit triggers the development of the most common type of endometrial cancer in women. Details of their work appear in the latest issue of the journal Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention.
The American Association for Cancer Research announces in a statement that cancer risks for women who drink a lot of sweetened soda are around 78 percent higher than those for women who do not. Apparently, the high sugar intake can easily lead to estrogen-dependent type I endometrial cancer.
The research group also determined that this correlation became stronger dependent on the amount of sugar post-menopausal women consumed. The more sweet beverages they drank, the higher their chances of developing this common form of endometrial cancer.
The investigation was led by research associate Maki Inoue-Choi, PhD, MS, RD, from the UM School of Public Health's Division of Epidemiology and Community Health. She says that these findings will have to be replicated in other studies, since this is the first time this connection has been demonstrated.
“Although ours is the first study to show this relationship, it is not surprising to see that women who drank more sugar-sweetened beverages had a higher risk of estrogen-dependent type I endometrial cancer but not estrogen-independent type II endometrial cancer,” Inoue-Choi explains.
“Other studies have shown increasing consumption of sugar-sweetened beverages has paralleled the increase in obesity. Obese women tend to have higher levels of estrogens and insulin than women of normal weight. Increased levels of estrogens and insulin are established risk factors for endometrial cancer,” she goes on to say.
The researcher and her team conducted this investigation using data that cover more than 23,000 women who have reached menopause, all enrolled in the Iowa Women’s Health Study. Test participants constantly reported demographic information about themselves, details on their medical history, as well as data of their dietary intake.