This week, a study in Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Prevention gave consumers a reason to not to fear hair relaxers. Researchers from Boston University and Howard University Cancer Center found that the type, frequency and duration of hair relaxer usage did not increase breast cancer risk.

In fact, an unexplained cancer concern inspired this relaxer study. For years medical studies have reported that breast cancer incidence is higher among African-American women age 40 or younger than among Caucasian women of the same age. Yet, this increased risk is not fully explained by known risk factors like race and family history.

To help explain the heightened cancer risk, the Black Women’s Health Study was launched across the United States in 1995. More than 59,000 women completed an initial questionnaire and more than 80 percent have answered follow-up questions every two years since, including questions about hair relaxer usage.

Lynn Rosenberg, ScD, professor of epidemiology at Boston University School of Public Health, led the study. Rosenberg explained that hair relaxer usage was important,“Because hair relaxers are more widely used by younger African-American women than they are used by older African-American women, a connection with increased risk of breast cancer in younger women seemed possible.”

The study discovered that women who used relaxers seven or more times a year over a 20 year span or longer had the same risk as women who used the chemicals for less than a year.

Even though researchers pinned no link between hair relaxers and breast cancer, Rosenberg cautions that, “…substances that are used by millions of women over a span of many years should be monitored for safety.”

Source:
American Association for Cancer Research (AACR). Hair Straightening Chemicals Not Linked to Breast Cancer Risk in African-Americans. Newswise; May 17, 2007.