Taller women more prone to cancer, concludes study

While past research has suggested a positive association between a person's height and an increased risk of cancer, many of those studies did not adjust for other factors that may have influenced the results.

But the most recent study on the topic -- published in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention -- suggests that a woman's chance of developing cancer after menopause increases with her height, even after adjusting for factors such as obesity.

"More cancers are associated with height than were associated with body mass index [BMI]," says Geoffrey Kabat, lead researcher and senior epidemiologist at Yeshiva University.

The study analyzed the data of 144,701 post-menopausal American women between the ages of 50-79 for an average of 12 years. During that time, 20,928 women developed new cancers.

The researchers also accounted for other factors such as age, education, smoking habits, alcohol consumption and hormone therapy.

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They found that for every 10-centimeter increase in height, there was a 13 per cent increase in risk of developing any cancer -- including cancers of the breast, colon, endometrium, kidney, ovaries, rectum, and thyroid, as well as myeloma and melanoma.

There was a 13 - 17 per cent increase in the risk of getting melanoma and cancers of the breast, ovary, endometrium and colon. There was a 23 - 29 per cent increase in the risk of developing cancers of the kidney, rectum, thyroid, and blood.

Of the 19 cancers studied, none showed a negative association with height.

The authors are careful to note that height is not a risk factor in itself. Rather, it is an indicator of other things that might be the "true" risk factor, such as growth hormones.

"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," says Kabat.

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He speculates that childhood diet is associated with hormones, which in turn is associated with height.

"At this point, it seems to be a plausible mechanism whereby early nutrition could affect growth and cancer," Kabat tells Reuters.

The media organization notes that tallness has been linked with a greater consumption of milk proteins in rapidly growing pre-pubescent girls. And in some of these studies, milk intake has been linked with higher levels of a protein that may play a role in abnormal cellular processes seen in cancers.

"It is also possible that the larger organ size and skin surface area associated with greater height may put more cells at risk of being transformed to malignancies," Kabat says.