A Medical Doctor at Medifem Hospital, Suliat Oyawoye, has revealed that people living with diabetes are at higher risk of developing breast cancer.

She said it was a study done a few years ago by an entity, which she did not identify.

Nonetheless, the cause or reason for it, according to her, is yet to be confirmed, as further research is being conducted to figure it out.

Dr. Oyawoye mentioned this in a conversation with KMJ, the royal host on Joy Prime’s morning show, concerning the myths and misconceptions about breast cancer to climax the breast cancer month.

“There’s been a link between diabetes and breast cancer. They’ve found that having diabetes increases your risk of getting breast cancer. There was a study that was done. But the link is still not sure whether it’s because you’re obese that is increasing your risk, the sugar level, or the diabetes itself. So, they’re still doing more research based on that,” she noted.

She also debunked claims that taking excessive sugar increases one’s risk of getting breast cancer, explaining that although sugar is the basic form of energy all cells in the body, including normal and cancer cells use, it does not cause breast cancer.

The medical practitioner added that obesity is connected to cancer, which is possibly the reason people believe the myth. She clarified that there had never been a link between them.

Some have also claimed that living an unhealthy lifestyle and excessively drinking alcohol could cause breast cancer, but Dr. Ayawoye also refuted the claim.

However, she said, “It increases your risk, but that doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll get it. It’s like a lottery kind of thing. When you buy more tokens, then the chances of you being picked are higher.”

Prior to that, she noted that it is important to maintain a healthy lifestyle in order to be protected from any form of cancer and other medical conditions, including heart disease and diabetes.

A meta-analysis conducted by a USA-based medical institute, including 16 studies published between 2000 and 2010, with 95% CIs were calculated using random-effects model, proving that “the combined evidence supports that diabetes was associated with a statistically significant 23% increased risk of breast cancer, especially in postmenopausal women (RR=1.25 95%CI 1.20-1.29). The correlation between diabetes and breast cancer was the most obvious in Europe.”

Also, according to a comprehensive review of research conducted by Johns Hopkins physicians led by Kimberly S. Peairs, M.D., “breast cancer patients are nearly 50 percent more likely to die of any cause if they also have diabetes."

The team lead further stated that in 2007, in the United States alone, roughly 24 million people had diabetes (about 8 percent of the population) and 2.5 million were survivors of breast cancer. Diabetics are known to have a higher risk of breast cancer.