Does Talcum Powder Cause Cancer?

Talcum Powder and Cancer

A friend had emailed me this article, and it made me quite paranoid because we both powder ourselves liberally. I decided to check whether or not the author of this article had cited from any real research studies, and if what she had cited was correct.

The first study of a potential link between talcum powder and cancer was originally published in The Journal of the National Cancer Institute. It did show that a significant percentage of women who used talcum powder were at higher risk for developing ovarian cancer than others. Researchers involved in this study, however, did not want to make the claim that talcum powder caused cancer because they did not feel that the study asked enough questions of the patients in regard to the age when they started talcum powder usage, what brands of talcum powder were used, and whether the women were menopausal or pre-menopausal.

This second study published by Epidemiology, according to the abstract, also shows that use of talc increases the risk of ovarian cancer. I wish I had access to the article, because the researchers had looked at other factors such as smoking, endometriosis, tubal ligation, etc.

The third study that I found showed no correlation between talc use and ovarian cancer! According to the abstract of this study, hospital based studies showed no increased risk of ovarian cancer and talc use, while population studies did. The researchers believed that, in population based studies, the researchers already had a bias as to a particular type of women to target for the study.

I could go on, but...I am just going to take a powder.