10/07/2026
Welcome to Wellness Wednesdays! 💚 Each month, one of our practitioners will lead a new series of conversations about your health.
October is Breast Cancer Awareness Month, and our Physician Assistant, Brigitte, is exploring breast cancer risk—from family history and hormones to everyday habits and the factors we may be able to influence.
‼️One in eight women in the U.S. will be diagnosed with breast cancer. ‼️
The American Cancer Society projects about 321,910 new invasive cases in 2026 — and incidence has been rising roughly 1% a year since 2012, with steeper increases in women under 50 and in Asian American and Pacific Islander women.
‼️But here's what gets lost in that number: only about 5–10% of breast cancers trace back to an inherited gene mutation — BRCA1/2 plus PALB2, CHEK2, ATM, TP53 and others. (Another 15–20% cluster in families without any identified mutation)
The rest arise from a mix:
🔹age
🔹reproductive history
🔹breast density
PLUS a long list of things that are genuinely modifiable such as:
🔸metabolic health
🔸hormone clearance
🔸inflammation
🔸gut function
🔸exposures
🔸and how your nervous system has been living.
We can't change your age or your genetics. 🧬
But researchers estimate a meaningful share of breast cancer is attributable to modifiable factors — and that share is where all of our leverage is:
🩸Blood sugar
🍸Alcohol
🤸Movement
💪Body composition
😴Sleep
😵💫Stress
🤢Gut health
🌞Vitamin D Exposures
Almost everything you'll hear this month is about finding breast cancer — screening, detection, early diagnosis. That matters enormously. But it's only half the conversation.
The other half is the terrain: the conditions your cells are living in every day.
That's what we're spending the rest of October on. Three more Wednesdays, one piece at a time.
Follow so you don't miss them and comment any questions you may have 🤍
