Doing This One Thing In Shower Doubles Your Risk Of Cancer: Are You Still Doing It?

The one mistake that we are trying to bring your attention to, while taking a shower, is douching. Douching is a process by which you squirt a mixture of liquids directly into your vagina.

This liquid might be a mixture of water, baking soda or iodine. The mixture enters into the vagina through a tube and comes out of the vagina itself. This practice is something that women have been advised not to do, as it may affect the natural acidity of the vagina.

There is a balance of good and harmful bacteria in the vagina, and this is necessary to maintain a healthy acidic environment in it. All kinds of infections and irritations are kept at bay due to this acidic environment.

Douching can lead to bacterial vaginosis and ovarian cancer. The reason behind this is the overgrowth of harmful bacteria that disrupt the normal balance of the vagina.

The condition can be very severe if you have already been diagnosed with some form of a vaginal infection, as it may push the bacteria, thereby the infection, into the uterus and cause pelvic inflammatory disease.

As per a recent study, women who admitted to douching had double the risk of ovarian cancer. Ovarian cancer is hard to be detected during the early stages, and is one of the fastest cancer killers. The experts are widely advising women not to douche and ditch this habit entirely.

Douching can also lead to other problems like vaginal irritation or dryness. It may also cause problems during pregnancy like pre-term birth or ectopic pregnancy, which is a condition in which the fertilised egg gets implanted outside the uterus.

The main reason why women douche is because they believe the process will help to keep the vagina clean and will also remove odour and other problems. On the contrary, they are either disrupting a healthy vagina or aggravating and making it possible for the bacteria to grow on.

Another major risk of douching is that it increases the chances of premature birth. Pregnant women tend to deliver their babies earlier when they douche.

Vagina has the ability to clean itself, and the only thing that needs to be done is to maintain its hygiene by washing it with plain water. According to health experts, women must completely avoid douching and switch over to cleaning the vagina and private parts with water alone.

One of the misconceptions that must be avoided is the belief that douching protects the women from pregnancy-related issues and sexually transmitted diseases (STDs). This is just a myth and douching can never prevent any of these.

Therefore, it is best to avoid this harmful habit while taking a shower before it's too late.