健康指南:腿長未必好事 癌症如影隨形(2)

“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.

最終，腫瘤是人體生長過程造成的結果，因此影響身高的激素或其他因素也會影響人患癌的概率這一說法是講得通的。耶斯希瓦大學阿爾伯特•愛因斯坦醫學院流行病學與大衆健康系高級流行病學專家傑弗裏•卡巴特在一份聲明中說。

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:

這其中有些因素可能是基因層面的，而還有一些可能與患者年輕時候所處的環境和攝入的營養有關。這篇文章的作者寫道：

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環境決定，而環境因素會影響人基因決定的遺傳潛能。關於環境對影響身高的證據明顯，19世紀初以來，很多國家人口的平均身高都在增高，這些似乎都是衛生和營養條件改善的反映。因此，身高應該被當作影響癌症患病率的一個或多個環境變因的標記，而不是作爲癌症風險因素之一。

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，生長在社會經濟條件較好的家庭中的女性，會比低收入家庭的女性身材要高，表明營養條件扮演着影響身高和癌症風險的角色。身高也許僅僅是營養條件的標記，發現這點或許可以改進我們對腫瘤的理解以及有效及預防和治療腫瘤的方法。“身高和癌症的關係提出了一些有趣的生物學問題，研究者們也可以提出很多新的解釋”，這項研究的主導者、阿爾伯特•愛因斯坦醫學院流行病學與大衆健康系教授兼主任托馬斯•羅翰博士說。

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.

同時，羅翰和他的同事表示該項研究並不意味着身高的女性必然患腫瘤。這項研究只是發現了身高與癌症之間的聯繫，並不是說這兩者之間存在因果關係。而生長這種發育過程也不可能是複雜的腫瘤的唯一原因。