Though some illnesses are random and many caused by the way you live your life, your family history can reveal your predisposition to certain conditions.
Some people take this to the extreme. If a parent died at a young age, they don't expect to live beyond that age, and they do nothing at all to change how they live. Some people have a false sense of security when their family history is good. Most women diagnosed with breast cancer have no family history. People can have strokes, diabetes, heart attacks and other cancers before others in their families.
Those who don't learn from family history may be destined to repeat it.
How we live our lives day by day and work with our physicians can foster our potential for longer, healthier lives.
There are a few basic things you should know about family history. Genetically, your closest relations are first-degree relatives who share half of your genes, including parents, siblings and children.
You are much more likely to share inherited health conditions with your first-degree relatives. That is why doctors are most interested in the histories of your immediate family members.
But if a condition has been diagnosed in multiple relatives across multiple generations, your odds of having the same condition are much greater. Your risk is even greater if an inherited condition arises at a relatively young age.
The standard screening for colon cancer begins at age 50 with either an annual stool test for occult or hidden blood or a colonoscopy every 10 years. The latter is much more expensive and not available for most of us.
However, if you have a significant family history of colon cancer, the appropriate screen would be a colonoscopy every five years beginning 10 years before the age of your youngest affected relative.
With this system of screening, benign polyps are often removed before they become cancerous.
If we wait for the appearance of symptoms such as narrow stools, severe constipation and progressive weight loss, we catch colon cancer at a stage more difficult to treat.
If you have a family history of heart disease, stroke or sudden death at a young age, you should be screened for possible modifiable risk factors such as high cholesterol, high blood pressure, abnormal heart rhythms, valvular heart disease and diabetes. Early intervention may prevent premature death or disability.
Your family history gives you and your physician invaluable information that can enable you to remain healthy and achieve your potential in life.
