健康指南:腿长未必好事 癌症如影随形(2)

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“Ultimately, cancer is a result of processes having to do with growth, so it makes sense that hormones or other growth factors that influence height may also influence cancer risk, said Geoffrey Kabat, a senior epidemiologist in the Department of Epidemiology and Population Health at Albert Einstein College of Medicine of Yeshiva University in a statement.

最终，肿瘤是人体生长过程造成的结果，因此影响身高的激素或其他因素也会影响人患癌的概率这一说法是讲得通的。耶斯希瓦大学阿尔伯特•爱因斯坦医学院流行病学与大众健康系高级流行病学专家杰弗里•卡巴特在一份声明中说。

Some of those common factors may be genetic, while others could be linked to environmental exposures or nutrition early in life. As the authors write:

这其中有些因素可能是基因层面的，而还有一些可能与患者年轻时候所处的环境和摄入的营养有关。这篇文章的作者写道：

Adult height is determined both by genetics and by early life exposures, and environmental circumstances influence the attainment of one’s genetic potential. The influence of environmental exposures on height is evidenced by the secular increase in the height of populations in many countries beginning in the 19th century, probably reflecting improvements in hygiene and nutrition. Height should thus be thought of as a marker for one or more exposures that influence cancer risk rather than a risk factor itself.

成年人的身高由基因和早期生活环境决定，而环境因素会影响人基因决定的遗传潜能。关于环境对影响身高的证据明显，19世纪初以来，很多国家人口的平均身高都在增高，这些似乎都是卫生和营养条件改善的反映。因此，身高应该被当作影响癌症患病率的一个或多个环境变因的标记，而不是作为癌症风险因素之一。

Women raised in higher socioeconomic households, for example, tended to be taller than those raised in lower income settings, reflecting the fact that different nutritional exposures may have played a role in both their height and cancer risk. Height may simply be a marker for factors such as nutrition, and identifying them may yield new understanding of about how to prevent and treat tumors more effectively, “[The association between height and cancer] raises some interesting biological questions, and investigators can come up with [new] explanations,” says the study’s senior author, Dr. Thomas Rohan, the chair and professor of epidemiology and population health at Albert Einstein College of Medicine.

比如，生长在社会经济条件较好的家庭中的女性，会比低收入家庭的女性身材要高，表明营养条件扮演着影响身高和癌症风险的角色。身高也许仅仅是营养条件的标记，发现这点或许可以改进我们对肿瘤的理解以及有效及预防和治疗肿瘤的方法。“身高和癌症的关系提出了一些有趣的生物学问题，研究者们也可以提出很多新的解释”，这项研究的主导者、阿尔伯特•爱因斯坦医学院流行病学与大众健康系教授兼主任托马斯•罗翰博士说。

In the meantime, Rohan and his colleagues say the study doesn’t imply that cancer is inevitable for every tall woman. The study found an association, not a cause-and-effect relationship. And it’s unlikely that diseases as complex as cancer can be traced to just one developmental process such as growth.

同时，罗翰和他的同事表示该项研究并不意味着身高的女性必然患肿瘤。这项研究只是发现了身高与癌症之间的联系，并不是说这两者之间存在因果关系。而生长这种发育过程也不可能是复杂的肿瘤的唯一原因。