ONE STEP AT A TIME
your health
Your Choices
You can make life- style choices that help diminish the harm your genes are doing.
and fi sh; and takes a daily cholesterol-lowering medi- cine. His cholesterol level today? A healthy 165. When it comes to your
health, knowing your family history is key, but, says Brandon Colby, M.D.,
author of Outsmart Your
Genes, it’s not going to do a whole lot of good unless you use that knowledge to protect yourself. “You can make lifestyle choices that help diminish the harm that these genes are doing.” For Sandra Collins, a 48-
year-old advertising copy- writer, that meant choosing menopause at age 35. “I always felt like cancer was this invisible family member sitting right there with us at family get-togethers,” says Collins, who saw generations of women wracked by the disease. Her great-grandmother, mom and aunt all died young from breast cancer. Collins knew her chance of avoiding a diagnosis was slim, and chose to have her ovaries removed and
have a double mastectomy. It wasn’t an easy decision, but for once, Collins felt this huge weight lifted. “There was no more thinking, ‘Is today going to be the day they fi nd the tumor?’” Only 5–10 percent of breast
cancer cases are hereditary, but people who carry these genes have a 50–85 percent chance of developing it. For Collins, the risk was too high to ignore. “This might be the hand I’m dealt, but it’s my decision what I do with it. I believe you are 100 percent responsible for the life you’re leading. And for
people who say, ‘I can’t do anything about this,’ I hope they realize it is in their power. Life is bigger than their disease.” Want to take control of your family’s fate?
Here’s what you can do: draw up your own family history using the steps below. Discuss your results with your doctor, and follow our steps to managing your genetic inheritance.
How to Record Your Family’s Health History
How well do you know your family history? Use these guidelines to create your family health portrait.
1
Start with your parents, grand– parents, brothers, sisters and children. Aunts, uncles, cousins, nieces, nephews and half-siblings may also be important.
24 HEALTHYADVICE.COM
2
Find out what diseases they have had, and at what age they were diagnosed. The younger they were, the more likely the genetic component.
3
Go beyond cancer. Ask about heart attacks, blood pressure, strokes, autoimmune diseases, mental illness, cholesterol, Alzheimer’s, diabetes, obesity, and addiction.
4
Learn about lifestyle. How often did they exercise? What kind of work did they do? How did they eat? Did they live near any highly polluted sites?
5
Bring a copy of your family history to your doctor, and share it with family members. You can also keep a record online at familyhistory.
hhs.gov.
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