The foods you eat affect your health. Being physically active is good for your heart and brain. Birth Control and Hormone Replacement Therapy (HRT). Lifestyle factors are known to influence health.
According to the World Health Organization (WHO), approximately one third of deaths are due to unhealthy lifestyle habits. Among lifestyle-related risk factors for head and neck cancers (HNC), alcohol consumption and smoking play an undeniable role in the multifactorial etiology of the disease. In recent years, the promotion of healthy lifestyle choices has received significant attention, as it contributes to improved health and disease prevention. Interventions to address these risk factors are vitally important in the prevention and progression of the disease.
However, to effectively prevent disease and reduce risk factors, it is crucial to identify the initial reasons that lead to the adoption of these lifestyle-related risk factors in the first place. Stress, being a constant aspect of modern life, is known to contribute to alcohol and smoking practices. In this review article, the PubMed database was searched for relevant literature on stress, lifestyle factors, HNC and cancer to explore the role of stress and its associated biological pathways as a prior factor in the adoption of lifestyle risk factors that cause HNC. It highlights the importance of stress pathways and the hypothalamus, pituitary and adrenal (HPA) axis as a site of interaction between stress, alcohol, smoking and cancer.
Despite their widely accepted harmful effects, alcohol and smoking are still deeply embedded in contemporary life. A better understanding of the impact of stress on lifestyle choices and an exploration of the mechanisms that cause stress-related cancer, alcohol and smoking could highlight opportunities to improve prevention measures by modifying unhealthy lifestyle choices. While genetic and biological factors are important in the transition from health to disease, lifestyle-related risk factors have received significant attention in recent years. Evidence that relates temporary stressful exposure to subsequent unhealthy patterns of smoking and alcohol consumption, and the association of these factors with the etiology of HNC, require a greater understanding of the underlying mechanisms that relate stress, lifestyle factors and cancer.
It also analyzes the biological mechanisms by which stressful events and the subsequent dysregulated stress pathways play a role in the adoption and continuation of lifestyle-related risk factors. Public health professionals can use lifestyle-related risk factor data from the Monitoring Network to determine if certain health outcomes are related to the environment or if they could also be due to lifestyle-related risk factors, such as smoking and lack of physical activity. The intention of this review is to highlight the role of stress as a previous factor in the recognized etiology of the lifestyle risk of HNC. Relevant literature was searched in the PubMed database on health, stress, lifestyle factors and HNC to explore the role of stress and its associated biological pathways as a prior factor in the adoption of lifestyle risk factors that cause HNC.
One of the limitations was the existence of extensive literature on these separate areas, for example, stress and alcohol, stress and smoking, HNC and lifestyle risk factors, but the lack of studies that combined stress, lifestyle risk factors and HNC. This may link childhood adversity as a risk factor for the development of anxiety disorders in adulthood and contribute to vulnerability to alcoholism in adulthood. When examining chronic diseases and their possible connection to the environment, it is important to consider lifestyle-related risk factors that could influence their development. Alcohol consumption and smoking slowly became deeply embedded in lifestyles on a cultural, social and individual level.
Therefore, it is important to identify the role that stress plays in the adoption of lifestyle-related risk factors in order to effectively eradicate them and prevent associated diseases. .
