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Smoking
Cessation: Health
Risks of Smoking
Assessing
Your Habit
Tips
to Help You Stop Smoking
Cigars:
Coolish or Foolish?
Managing
Nicotine Withdrawal Symptoms
Secondhand
Smoke: Protect Yourself and Your Loved Ones
Snuffing
Our Smokeless Tobacco Use
UPMC
Patient Education Fact Sheets on Smoking
UPMC holds
smoking cessation classes throughout the year. To find one near
you, please visit www.upmc.com/Events.htm
or call 800-533-UPMC (8762).
Cigarette smoking
is the number one cause of preventable death in the United States,
killing 400,000 people a year. Smokers and people who live with
smokers are at risk for a number of health conditions and diseases.
A nonsmoker in a very smoky room for one hour inhales the same dangerous
contaminants as he or she would by smoking 10 or more cigarettes.
Smoking is even more dangerous for people who have heart
disease, high blood
pressure, diabetes, high
cholesterol, or a family history of any of these diseases. Diseases
associated with smoking include:
Heart
disease
Smoking is responsible for at least 20 percent of all deaths from
heart
disease in the United States. The more a person smokes, the
higher his or her chances of developing coronary heart disease.
Women who smoke have a 50 percent greater risk of having a heart
attack than male smokers. Smoking plays a role in heart disease
by:
- Lowering
"good" (HDL) cholesterol
- Causing deterioration
of the elasticity of the aorta
- Increasing
the activity of the sympathetic nervous system, which regulates
the heart and blood vessels
- Damaging
the arteries
Cancer
Smoking is responsible for about 30 percent of all cancer
deaths in the United States and plays a significant role in the
changing cancer rates throughout the world. Smoking causes:
Smokers also
have higher rates of:
Stroke
Smoking increases the risk of having a stroke,
especially in individuals who smoke a pack or more of cigarettes
a day, and in women who take oral contraceptives.
Dementia
A recent study suggests that smokers have 1.5 times the risk of
developing Alzheimer's disease
than those who don't smoke.
Lung
disease
Smokers have much higher rates of pneumonia,
flu, bronchitis
and emphysema.
Smoking also aggravates symptoms of asthma.
Pregnancy
and birth problems
Smoking has been linked to:
Bone
problems
Peptic
ulcers
Smoking increases acid secretion and decreases mucosal blood flow.
The results of some studies have suggested that smoking delays the
healing of peptic ulcers.
Other studies suggest that smokers have more relapses once an peptic
ulcer is healed.
Problems
with male sexuality and reproduction
- Men who
are heavy smokers are at increased risk for developing erectile
dysfunction.
- Smoking can
contribute to infertility by reducing sperm density and motility.
Skin,
hair and teeth disorders
- Smokers
tend to develop more wrinkles compared to nonsmokers.
- Smoking increases
the risk for baldness and premature gray hair.
- Smokers are
more apt to have tooth and gum problems.
Eye
problems
- Smokers
may have an increased risk of developing cataracts
- Smokers have
an increased risk of macular degeneration.
Thyroid
problems
- Cyanide
in tobacco smoke may interfere with thyroid
hormone.
- Female smokers
with subclinical hypothyroidism have an increased risk of severe
thyroid failure compared to nonsmoking women with the same condition.
Other
problems
Some studies suggest that smokers are more likely to develop incontinence
and hearing loss.
Problems
in children (due to secondhand smoke)
Approximately 4 million children become ill from being exposed to
secondhand smoke. Children exposed to secondhand smoke and smoking
parents have an increased risk of:
The more cigarettes
a person smokes each day, the greater the risk for disease. Cigar
and pipe smoking are also dangerous and increase the risk of
many diseases. Smokers can substantially reduce their risk of many
of these diseases by quitting before there is irreverable damage.
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