The Karen Hospital

SMOKING

The World Health Organization states that tobacco-related diseases are the single most important cause of preventable deaths in the world. What people don’t know or may be choose to ignore is that smoking and passive smoking leads to more than 20 major categories of fatal and disabling diseases, including cancer of the lungs, throat, stomach, oesophagus among other cancers. It is rather sad that what may have started as a little fun or a result of negative peer pressure influence develops into an addictive demon ravaging our insides leaving fatal diseases in its wake.

Smoking and cardiovascular disease

Betty Weru, a Respiratory specialist at The Karen Hospital fully understands the adverse health effects brought about by smoking. “Smoking causes a number of health conditions,” she says. Having worked both in the United States and at The Karen Hospital she has had a firsthand exposure to the detrimental state that comes with smoking. She says that smokers are at a greater risk for heart and cardiovascular diseases. These are diseases that not only affect the heart but blood vessels as well. They include conditions such as stroke and coronary heart disease. Stroke is brought about when a clot blocks the blood flow to part of your brain or when a blood vessel in or around your brain bursts. There is also the risk of developing peripheral artery disease which can lead to amputation of legs. This is because blockages caused by smoking can also reduce blood flow to your legs and skin. It also increases the risk of developing high blood pressure because damages to blood vessels include thickening and narrowing of blood vessels causing an increase in the heart beat. The risks are very high irrespective of how many cigarettes one smokes in a day.

Smoking and respiratory disease

She also says that smoking can lead to lung disease by damaging airways and the small air sacs (alveoli) found in the lungs. An example of lung diseases caused by smoking includes chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) that includes emphysema and chronic bronchitis. Cigarette smoking is attributed to most cases of lung cancer. Tobacco smoke can also trigger an asthma attack or make it worse. Smokers are 12 to 13 times more likely to die from COPD than nonsmokers.

Smoking and cancer

Smoking can lead to the development of cancer anywhere in the body. It also heightens the risk of succumbing to cancer and other diseases in cancer patients and survivors.

Smoking and other health risks

Every organ of the body is affected by smoking. Additionally, it makes it harder for a woman to conceive and also affect her baby’s health before and after birth. Smoking in pregnant women comes with a myriad of health effects to the baby such preterm (early) delivery, stillbirth (death of the baby before birth), low birth weight, sudden infant death syndrome (known as SIDS or crib death), ectopic pregnancy and orofacial clefts in infants.

Men's sperms are also affected by smoking; this can reduce fertility and raise risks for birth defects and miscarriages.

Women smokers past childbearing age tend to have weaker bones and are at an elevated risk for broken bones than women who have never smoked.

There is more; smoking not only affects your gums but teeth too and can lead to tooth loss. It also increases your risk for development of cataracts. This is the clouding of the lens of the eye making it hard for one to see.

Smoking is also a known cause of type 2 diabetes mellitus and can also make it extremely difficult to manage. For smokers the risk of developing diabetes is 30 to 40 per cent higher than for nonsmokers.

Other adverse effects brought about by smoking include inflammation and decreased immune function. It can also cause rheumatoid arthritis.

Quitting and reduced risks

For those courageous enough to stop smoking, their risk of developing cardiovascular disorders is greatly reduced. One year after quitting, your risk of getting a heart attack drops sharply. Two to five years after quitting, your risk for developing stroke could drastically reduce to about the same as a nonsmoker’s. After five years your risk of developing cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus and bladder drops by half and that of developing lung cancer drops by half after ten years.

Should one decide to quit smoking help is available at The Karen Hospital. Betty Weru runs the smoking cessation programme. This entails conducting educational sessions whose main objective is to enlighten the client on the disease process; how their body is being affected by smoking. One is advised on what lifestyle changes to embrace in a bid to avoid triggers that would lead one to smoking again. There is also medication to help quit smoking and includes use of the smoking patch. She says that one of the biggest hurdles is consistency among those who want to quit. It is not usually an easy journey irrespective of how long you have been smoking but we promise to be there every step of the way.