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 “These results support the majority of literature, including that of
the U.S. Surgeon General,” said senior author Dr. Ali Ahmed of the
Center for Health and Aging at the Washington DC VA Medical Center.
But those who were heavy smokers – meaning at least a pack a day for
32 years or more - do still have an elevated risk, even after 15
years, which was a surprise, Ahmed told Reuters Health by email.
“While all individuals who quit smoking will benefit from a
decreased chance of death, to achieve the full complement of health
benefits of smoking cessation of one who has never smoked, smokers
need to smoke less and quit early, and for those are not smokers –
never start smoking,” he said.
Ahmed and his coauthors used the ongoing Cardiovascular Health Study
of adults over age 65, which included 2556 people who had never
smoked, 629 current smokers and 1297 former smokers who had quit at
least 15 years earlier. Of those who had quit, 312 had been heavy
smokers, with 32 “pack-years” or more of smoking.
After 13 years of follow-up, about 21 percent of never smokers and
21 percent of former smokers experienced heart failure. But among
former smokers with at least 32 pack-years, almost 30 percent
suffered heart failure.
When the researchers accounted for other factors like age, sex,
race, education, other health conditions and medications, current
smokers were about 50 percent more likely to have heart failure than
never smokers or former smokers, as reported in Circulation: Heart
Failure.
Over the same time period, current smokers were twice as likely to
die from any cause, compared to never-smokers, and former heavy
smokers were about 26 percent more likely than never-smokers to die.
“When one smokes, it induces atherosclerosis, or the buildup of
plaque in the arteries,” which narrows the arteries and increases
the risk of blood clot or heart attack, Ahmed said. “However, when
one quits smoking, the buildup of plaque and risk of blood of clots
decreases, allowing one’s cardiovascular risk to return to normal
over time.”
“To date, this is the first study that investigated the role of
amount and duration of prior smoking on the health benefits of
prolonged cessation for former smokers,” said Dr. Gerasimos Siasos
of Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston, Massachusetts, who was
not part of the study.
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Former heavy smokers may not achieve the health profile of never
smokers, but the cardiovascular risk for them is definitely lower
compared to current smokers, Siasos told Reuters Health by email.
Quitting smoking also reduces the risk of lung cancer and other
cancers of the upper gastrointestinal tract, said Bich Tran, a
public health and epidemiology researcher at the University of New
South Wales in Sydney, Australia. Tran was also not involved in the
new study.
Disease risk starts to decrease as soon as you quit, even for people
of older age, she said.
“Our body can heal itself,” Tran told Reuters Health by email.
“Within 12 hours or few days after the smoking, the level of carbon
monoxide in blood will decline and the circulatory system will start
repairing the damage.”
This is a slow process and sometimes quitting smoking can cause
discomforts like weight gain, sore gums and tongue, coughing or
trouble sleeping, she noted.
“These results highlight the importance of smoking cessation for
cardiovascular health and moreover support the notion that smokers
who cannot quit should be encouraged to reduce their amount of
smoking,” Siasos said.
Doctors should target former heavy smokers for cardiovascular
screening, he said.
SOURCE: http://bit.ly/1IZTfqx Circulation: Heart Failure, online
June 2, 2015.
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