A cigarette habit and previous infection with a common virus both have important effects on the immune system. By Heidi LedfordClose up of a man as he smokes a cigarette in Sundbyberg, near Stockholm.The immune-system signature of cigarette smoking persists for many years after a person kicks the habit.Credit: Jonathan Nackstrand/AFP via Getty The impacts...
Tag: <span>Smoking</span>
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Quitting smoking at any age brings big health benefits, fast: Study
by Jim Oldfield, University of Toronto Credit: CC0 Public DomainPeople who quit smoking see major gains in life expectancy after just a few years, according to a new study by University of Toronto researchers at Unity Health Toronto. The study, published in NEJM Evidence, shows that smokers who quit smoking before age 40 can expect to...
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Researchers decode the link between smoking and amyotrophic lateral sclerosis risk
by Pusan National University A new study from Pusan National University shows that smoking is positively associated with the risk of developing amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, predominantly affecting women. Discontinuing smoking can potentially reduce the ALS risk. Credit: Dr. Yun Hak Kim / Pusan National UniversityAmyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a neurodegenerative disorder, is a significant global health...
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Smoking causes brain shrinkage, but quitting may prevent further loss
Cigarette smoking causes the brain to shrink, according to a new study from researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis, MO (WashUMed). Brain shrinkage is also associated with an increased risk of cognitive impairment, dementia, and Alzheimer’s disease (AD). The study’s results show that quitting smoking at any time stopped further gray...
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Diabetes drug may significantly lower women’s risk of substantial weight gain after giving up smoking
by British Medical Journal Credit: Pixabay/CC0 Public Domain The diabetes drug dulaglutide (Trulicity) may significantly lower a woman’s risk of substantial weight gain after she has given up smoking, finds a secondary analysis of clinical trial data, published in the open access journal BMJ Nutrition Prevention & Health. Women seem to be five times as likely...
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Study shows smoking likely leads to brain shrinkage
by Washington University School of Medicine Overview of the study. We examined: 1) the predictive ability of the smoking initiation polygenic risk score (PRS) for smoking for a history of daily smoking; 2) the association between the smoking initiation PRS for smoking initiation and brain measures; and 3) the association between smoking behaviors and brain measures....
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Decline in excess mortality seen in first decade after quitting smoking
by Elana Gotkine Former smokers avoid more than half of the excess cardiovascular, cancer, and respiratory mortality associated with current smoking within the first decade after quitting, according to a research letter published online Nov. 27 in JAMA Internal Medicine. Blake Thomson, D.Phil., and Farhad Islami, M.D., Ph.D., from the American Cancer Society in Atlanta,...
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Is muscle weakness the new smoking? Grip strength tied to accelerated biological age, study shows
by Noah Fromson, University of Michigan Credit: Justine Ross, Michigan Medicine Everyone ages at a different pace. That’s why two 50-year-olds, despite living the same number of years, may have different biological ages—meaning that a host of intrinsic and extrinsic factors have caused them to age at varying paces with different levels of risk for...
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Being lonely and unhappy accelerates aging more than smoking, study finds
by Deep Longevity Research confirms: Psychological issues can accelerate your pace of aging. Credit: Fedor Galkin Molecular damage accumulates and contributes to the development of aging-related frailty and serious diseases. In some people these molecular processes are more intense than in others, a condition commonly referred to as accelerated aging. Fortunately, the increased pace of...
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Smoking may increase odds of Meniere disease in men
For men, smoking is positively related and alcohol consumption is negatively related to the risk for Meniere disease (MD), according to a study published online Aug. 26 in the Journal of Clinical Medicine. So Young Kim, Ph.D., from the CHA University in Seongnam, South Korea, and colleagues examined the association of smoking, alcohol consumption, and obesity with...