http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-11880415Researchers made the discovery after comparing the hands of 1,500 prostate cancer patients with 3,000 healthy men. The length of the fingers is fixed before birth and is thought to relate to sex hormone levels in the womb. Being exposed to less testosterone before birth results in a longer index finger and may protect against prostate cancer later in life, say researchers at the University of Warwick and the Institute of Cancer Research.
One of the report authors, Professor Ros Eeles, said more studies would be needed, but if these confirmed the findings it could be used a simple test for prostate cancer risk. She said: "This exciting finding means that finger pattern could potentially be used to select at-risk men for ongoing screening, perhaps in combination with other factors such as family history or genetic testing."
Mind you, the BBC has reported other findings re finger length over the years. In October 2001, it highlighted this report -
And only last year, this one -Scientists at Liverpool University have established a link between the length of baby boys' fingers and their chances of going on to have a heart attack at an unusually young age.
2 years earlier, it reported with yet another -Scientists at Cambridge University found that financial traders whose ring fingers are longer than their index fingers make the most money. The link could be down to testosterone exposure in the womb, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences says
How come it's always the fingers? What about toe lengths, BBC? I have one toe on one foot that is longer than on the other. Please tell me: am I brilliant, or likely to succumb to some dreadful illness after Christmas?Children's academic strengths can be predicted by the relative lengths of their fingers, claim researchers. The study of 75 seven-year-old children found those with shorter ring fingers than their index fingers did better in tests at literacy than maths. Those with longer ring fingers were better at maths than literacy, said the British Journal of Psychology study. The UK team said the link was caused by children's exposure to different levels of hormones in the womb.
