Working Women at Greater Risk of Breast Cancer: Study

With professional life comes stress. For women it could be more harmful because a latest study shows that they have increased chances of developing breast cancer due to work stress.

The research states that working women have 70 percent of chances getting breast cancer. Prejudice, discrimination and resistance are some of the stress factors behind the increasing incidences of breast cancer in working women.

The research was based on a 55-year study on women in their in 30s in the 1970s. It concentrated on around 4,000 women aged 36 in 1975. The study showed that the more they held the job the higher risk of developing breast cancer.

The researchers said that while women going into management in the 1970s were breaking new ground, things have not changed much for women of today who face the same issues , The Independent reported.

"Women who entered managerial occupations in the 1970's experienced prejudice and discrimination due to prevailing cultural attitudes that men made better leaders than women,'' said lead author Dr Tetyana Pudrovska. "Neither men or women preferred to work for a woman because women were seen as "temperamentally unfit" for management, which was consistent with the cultural stereotype of the woman boss.

"Exercising job authority was particularly stressful for women in the context of gender inequality embedded in the occupational structure of the time, when women in managerial positions often faced prejudice, tokenism, discrimination, social isolation, and resistance from subordinates, colleagues, and superiors. We believe that women are still facing the same kind of stresses, and therefore the increased risk is likely to be there... today," Dr Pudrovska said.