As Gina Rodriguez would say: Mama, let's research
Nowadays, it seems EVERYTHING has the potential to cause cancer, from our cell phones to highly processed foods.The latest product to join the growing list? Hair dye. Earlier this month, the International Journal of Cancer published an internet-breaking study on a possible link between breast cancer and the use of permanent hair dye and chemical hair straighteners, and the results were a little alarming.
What should I know about the study? The study, conducted by researchers at the National Institutes of Health in the U.S., set out to examine a possible link between permanent hair dye and chemical straightener use and breast cancer risk by ethnicity. A total of 46,709 breast-cancer-free women between the ages of 35 and 74 participated, and they were followed for an eight-year period.
Why is hair dye a concern? In case you didn’t know, there are over 5,000 chemicals found in hair products; hair dye is commonly known to contain ammonia, benzene and peroxide. “The concern is that some of these chemicals could be absorbed by the body and travel to breast tissue or, alternatively, affect the endocrine [hormonal] system,” explains Dr. Elysia Donovan, a radiation oncologist at the Odette Cancer Centre at Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre in Toronto.
Are there any limitations in this study? Yes—as with any study—so we should consider these findings critically. As Kotsopoulos points out, participants weren’t asked about their use of these products after the initial questionnaire. “The researchers only assessed the exposure once,” she says. “We don’t know whether participants’ hair dye preferences changed or if they stopped or started using the products during the eight-year study, so that’s one limitation,” she says.
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