Skip to main content

Quitting smoking cuts risk of death from cancer and heart diseases

Women who quit smoking reduce their risk of dying from heart disease and tobacco related cancers. Researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health analyzed data on 105,000 women over 24 years, taken from the Nurses' Health Study, a long-term survey that began at Harvard in 1976. Stacey Kenfield is lead author of the new report. She says the data show harm from smoking can be reversed over time to the level of a non-smoker. "For coronary heart disease for example, your risk declines to a non-smokers' risk within 20 years. For all causes it declines at 20 years. For lung cancer it is after 30 years." Kenfield says scientists observed almost immediate benefits when the women kicked the habit. "We saw a 47 percent reduction in risk for coronary heart disease within the first five years [of quitting] and a 21 percent reduction in lung cancer death within the first five years."

Kenfield says the data also indicate that smoking is more dangerous the younger a woman is when she starts. "If you start before you are 17, you have a 21-fold higher risk than a non-smoker. But if you start after the age of 26 you only have a 9-fold higher risk of dying from lung cancer." Based on that evidence, Kenfield recommends high schools offer more programs to help students quit. "If you would like to see the whole potential benefit from your cigarette cessation, you really need to quit as soon as possible." Tobacco is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States. The World Health Organization attributed 5 million deaths to smoking in 2000. That number is expected to climb to 10 million tobacco-related deaths by 2030. Kenfield's study is published in the Journal of the American Medical Association. via VOA.com
Labels:

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Charging Implanted Heart Pumps Wirelessly

Mechanical pumps to give failing hearts a boost were originally developed as temporary measures for patients awaiting a heart transplant. But as the technology has improved, these ventricular assist devices commonly operate in patients for years, including in former vice-president Dick Cheney, whose implant this month celebrates its one-year anniversary. Prolonged use, however, has its own problems. The power cord that protrudes through the patient's belly is cumbersome and prone to infection over time. Infections occur in close to 40 percent of patients, are the leading cause of rehospitalization, and can be fatal. Researchers at the University of Washington and the University of Pittsburgh Medical Center have tested a wireless power system for ventricular assist devices. They recently presented the work in Washington, D.C. at the American Society for Artificial Internal Organs annual meeting, where it received the Willem Kolff/Donald B. Olsen Award for most promising research in
Post a Comment
Read more

Autism and Eye Contact: Genes very much are involved

We have now a lot of evidence on genetic components in many disorders including neurological in both adults and kids. Autism is one such problem that has many genes involved. Research is still in full swing to find more genes and related pathways. However, one can find autistic features more phenotypically before genotyping. Eye contact is one of them. Studies have shown that autistic kids make less eye contact. This has been shown to have genetic component now. New research has uncovered compelling evidence that genetics plays a major role in how children look at the world and whether they have a preference for gazing at people's eyes and faces or at objects. The discovery by researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and Emory University School of Medicine in Atlanta adds new detail to understanding the causes of autism spectrum disorder. The results show that the moment-to-moment movements of children's eyes as they seek visual information about the
Read more

How much people depend on weather reports

Meteorologists on television, radio, online, and in newspapers supply weather reports to the average person over 100 times a month. Surveys demonstrated that the 300 billion forecasts accessed generate a value of $285 per household every year, or $32 billion for the entire United States. Odds are you have already watched one weather forecast today and will probably check out a few more. Accurate, timely forecasts are vital to everyday life, but just how critical may surprise you. Whether at work or play, you probably watch the weather quite closely. Most of us are at the weather person's mercy to know what to wear, what to expect, to prepare for the worst. New research shows the average United States household checks out a weather report more than three times a day. "It impacts pretty much every part of every activity we are involved with for the most part," Jeff Lazo, the director of the Societal Impacts Program at the National Center for Atmospheric Research (NCAR) in B
Post a Comment
Read more