NEW YORK - A study suggests that women who are left-handed have a higher risk of dying, particularly from cancer and cerebrovascular disease -- damage to an artery in the brain or an artery that supplies blood to the brain.
While it could be a chance finding andthe evidence is far from conclusive, numerous reports have associated left-handedness with various disorders and, in general, a shorter life span, Dutch researchers note in their report in the journal Epidemiology.
"Left-handers are reported to be underrepresented in the older age groups, although such findings are still much debated," write Dr. Made K. Ramadhani and colleagues fromved, Ramadhani and colleagues suggest. Much of the research into handedness and mortality has been fueled by the hypothesis that left-handedness is the result of an insult suffered during prenatal life, which ultimately leads to the early death.
The author of a commentary, Dr. Olga Basso, who is left-handed, is highly skeptical, in general, of research relating disease and death with handedness. "I am not alone in thinking that the literature on handedness suffers from a number of ills," regardless of the putative illnesses seen in those who are left-handed, she notes.
"Having successfully dodged a number of disorders," adds Basso, "I doubt that my left hand is prematurely pulling me toward my grave."
Basso is with National Institute of Environmental Health Sciences, Research Triangle Park, North Carolina.
