Giving birth over the age of 40 could prevent womb cancer

Research shows having children at age 40+ could lower risk of womb cancer

Unlike what we have been led to believe in the past, new research has suggested that having children over the age of 40 is beneficial to women.

The advantages of giving birth at a later age are associated with a decrease in developing endometrial cancer.

Researchers from the University of Southern California have found that women who have their last baby at 40 or older are at 44 per cent lower risk of developing the disease as against those having given birth earlier.

It has been revealed that the risk begins to decrease after age 30 by around 13 per cent for each five-year delay in last births.

Endometrial cancer is the most common type of uterine cancer that strikes the endometrium, the tissue lining the womb. It is the most common gynecological cancer in the U.S. and U.K where in 2007 7,536 new cases were diagnosed in the U.K.

A study was carried out which analysed data from over 8,600 endometrial cancer cases and 16,562 control subjects, who gave birth after age 30.

'We found that the lower risk of endometrial cancer continued for older mothers across different age-at-diagnosis groups, including under 50, 50-59, 60-69, and over 70 - which shows that the protection persists for many years' study leader Dr Veronica Setiawan says.

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