Today, I would like to introduce you to my colleague at The UltraWellness Center in Lenox Massachusetts, Dr. Elizabeth Boham. She is a physician who practices Functional Medicine and is a Registered Dietitian. Among other things, Dr. Boham works every day with women who come to see her to help them decrease their risk of breast cancer. She wrote the following blog to give you some simple steps you can take to substantially decrease your chances of getting breast cancer.

--Dr Mark Hyman

Breast cancer is a serious concern, especially if you already suffered from the disease and are now afraid of a recurrence. If you are worried, it’s understandable. The incidence of breast cancer is skyrocketing ...

Last year over 200,000 new cases of invasive breast cancer and 60,000 cases of non-invasive breast cancer were diagnosed. A woman’s risk of getting breast cancer has jumped from 1 in 20 in the 1960s to 1 in 8 today. Tragically, more than 40,000 women died from breast cancer alone last year.

Why has there been such a huge escalation in the rates of this frightening disease? What’s the cause of this epidemic and what can we do about it?

Getting to the bottom of these questions is of personal interest to me. When I was 30 years old, I was diagnosed with an aggressive type of invasive breast cancer. At the time I thought I was healthy ...

Before I went to med school my background was in nutrition and exercise physiology. I was an athlete, an avid exerciser, and was careful with my diet. I was young, had no family history of breast cancer, nor any signs of chronic illness.

So when I was told I should have a mass in my breast removed, the last thing I thought it would be was cancer. I couldn’t understand how an otherwise healthy woman, like me, could get cancer. What did I do wrong? What could I do to reduce my risk of recurrence?

Looking for answers to these questions sent me on a journey through my medical training and eventually to an education in Functional Medicine. What I discovered on that journey is that there are ways you can prevent breast cancer and reduce your risk of recurrence. In today’s blog I will share what I have learned. I will explain some of the underlying root causes of breast cancer and provide 9 tips to help you reduce your risk.

Today, I would like to introduce you to my colleague at The UltraWellness Center in Lenox Massachusetts, Dr. Elizabeth Boham. She is a physician who practices Functional Medicine and is a Registered Dietitian.

Among other things, Dr. Boham works every day with women who come to see her to help them decrease their risk of breast cancer. She wrote the following blog to give you some simple steps you can take to substantially decrease your chances of getting breast cancer.

—Dr Mark Hyman

Do you worry about getting breast cancer? Have you already suffered from the disease and are now afraid of a recurrence? I understand why. The incidence of breast cancer is skyrocketing ...

Last year over 200,000 new cases of invasive breast cancer and 60,000 cases of non-invasive breast cancer were diagnosed. A woman’s risk of getting breast cancer has jumped from 1 in 20 in the 1960s to 1 in 8 today. Tragically, more than 40,000 women died from breast cancer alone last year.

Why has there been such a huge escalation in the rates of this frightening disease? What’s the cause of this epidemic and what can we do about it?

Getting to the bottom of these questions is of personal interest to me. When I was 30 years old, I was diagnosed with an aggressive type of invasive breast cancer. At the time I thought I was healthy ...

Before I went to med school my background was in nutrition and exercise physiology. I was an athlete, an avid exerciser, and was careful with my diet. I was young, had no family history of breast cancer, nor any signs of chronic illness.

So when I was told I should have a mass in my breast removed, the last thing I thought it would be was cancer.

How does an otherwise healthy woman get cancer? What did I do wrong? What can I do to reduce my risk of recurrence?

Looking for answers to these questions sent me on a journey through my medical training and eventually to an education in Functional Medicine.

What I discovered on that journey is what I want to share with you in today’s blog.

"Seventy-five percent of women suffer from headaches, mood swings, bloating, and other problems that threaten their relationships, work life, and well-being." It's a statement that most of us unconsciously accept without a second thought. But it doesn't have to be this way ...

It's true that the symptoms of premenstrual syndrome (PMS), like mood swings, irritability, depression, anxiety, fluid retention, bloating, breast tenderness, sugar cravings, headaches, and sleep disturbances, affect 75 percent of women. And in 20 percent of those women, the symptoms are so severe that they need medical treatment. About 8 percent have such extreme symptoms that the problem has been given a new name: premenstrual dysphoric disorder (PMDD).

But just because you're a woman doesn't mean you have to live with these symptoms. The real fact is that suffering related to menstrual cycles is unnecessary -- and not caused by bad luck, but by bad habits, environmental toxins, and stress.

Of course, the drug companies don't want you to know that! So the conventional treatments for PMS range from anti-inflammatory drugs such as Advil or Aleve to birth control pills. And then there are the big guns ...

These include prescription medications such as danazol, a drug that suppresses ovulation and causes increased facial hair, acne, and a deep voice. Newer, very expensive drugs called gonadatropin-releasing hormone (GnRH) analogs actually change brain chemistry to turn off the ovaries' production of estrogen and progesterone -- but they also lead to osteoporosis.

Sometimes, diuretics like spironolactone are used to treat fluid retention. A drug called bromocriptine can be used to stop prolactin production and is used to treat breast tenderness.

No wonder the drug companies want you to believe that PMS is inevitable. Recently, they even helped create a new disease -- PMDD -- and a new indication for a drug whose patent was running out: Prozac (now called Sarafem). What's wrong with this picture?

It's based on the assumption that the symptoms of PMS are an inevitable part of being a woman and require "medical intervention" with serious medication to correct them. Nothing could be further from the truth!

To think that 75 percent of women have a design flaw that requires medical treatment to live a normal life is just absurd.

If you are one of the many women that suffer from PMS, you an end your suffering using 5 simple dietary and lifestyle interventions. In today's blog I will explain how to do that. But first, I want to tell you a story.