Quitting tobacco makes a difference
Smoking and chronic or long-lasting disease can often go hand-in-hand.
The good news? Quitting smoking helps. Reducing your risk, improving treatment and your quality of life!
No matter how long you've smoked, quitting can help improve your health.
Your body begins healing soon after you quit, and will continue to heal the longer you’re smoke–free.
Quitting smoking can mean improving treatment, managing your condition better, and stopping symptoms.
If you have been diagnosed with a chronic condition and are currently taking medications to manage your condition,
remember to
talk with
your healthcare provider
before quitting smoking.
Why? When you quit, changes to nicotine levels in the body may impact the effectiveness of medications.
Your healthcare provider is the best person to help you quit
smoking safely and effectively.
Help to quit
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Improving treatment
Asthma
– after you quit smoking, the benefits start right away.
No matter how long you have smoked,
your health can improve.
In fact, in just two to three months after stopping smoking, your
lung function improves.
This means a lower risk of an asthma attack and less breathlessness and coughing –
making daily tasks a little easier.
Breathe easier within days after quitting smoking.
Continued smoking can worsen asthma symptoms...
Why?
Irritation
Tobacco smoke can irritate your airways, making asthma worse and harder to control, and increasing the risk of an attack.
Medication effectiveness
Smoking can undo the effectiveness of your asthma medication.
Children with asthma
Smoking around children with asthma can trigger an asthma attack.
Cancer
– quitting smoking makes a difference.
When you quit smoking, you are more likely to live longer after your treatment,
cancer can respond better to treatment, wounds heal better, and nicotine in your body is cleared. This is important because
nicotine can actually speed up the growth of cancer.
Quitting smoking can also mean
improved lung health, appetite, sleep, and energy level.
If you have cancer, quitting smoking is part of your treatment – just like surgery, chemotherapy, or
radiation therapy.
Smoking when you have cancer can weaken wound healing after surgery. Smoking can also increase the risk of:
- complication and infection from surgery,
- complication and infection from surgery,
- getting another form of cancer, and
- cancer returning following treatment.
Smoking can also increase the growth of cancer and decrease the effectiveness of your chemotherapy.
COPD
, or chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, is also called emphysema or chronic bronchitis. COPD is caused
by continued, long-term exposure to irritants – most commonly tobacco smoke. Symptoms of COPD can include chronic cough, shortness of breath,
chest tightness, wheezing, and an increase in the production of mucus.
After you quit smoking – the benefits are big
You are more likely to
live longer
after your treatment
The single most important thing you can do to
slow down the progression of COPD
is to quit smoking
No matter how long you have smoked,
your health can get better
when you quit
After just one to nine months of quitting smoking, your
coughing, sinus congestion, fatigue and shortness of breath decrease
The trouble with continuing to smoke...
10x
When you smoke, you can be 10 times more likely to die prematurely from COPD than someone who does not smoke.
80-90%
Of those who die from COPD-related deaths, as high as 80% to 90% are smokers.
Diabetes
– no matter how long you have smoked, your health can get better when you quit.
After you quit - the benefits of quitting are big
Better blood sugar control
Improved action of insulin
Less risk of having diabetic nerve and kidney problems
Lower blood pressure and cholesterol
Smoking does impact your diabetes
Tobacco has many health effects, especially for people with diabetes. Did you know the risk of getting diabetes is higher for smokers? That's because
smoking doubles the damage from diabetes
by damaging the arteries. Diabetic smokers are more likely to get nerve damage and kidney disease, and three times more
likely to die of heart disease. Smoking can also raise your blood sugar level and
weaken the impact of insulin –
making it harder to control diabetes.
2x
Smoking can double the damage from diabetes
3x
Diabetic smokers are three times more
likely to die of heart disease.
Heart disease
– quitting smoking helps to prevent and treat heart disease.
Show your heart some love – stopping smoking makes a difference...
No matter how long you have smoked, your health can get better
More oxygen in your blood and for your heart
Blood pressure and heart rate drops
Less risk for a heart attack
You will likely live longer
How does smoking impact heart disease?
Heart disease is the leading cause of death in the U.S. Heart disease includes coronary heart disease, heart attack,
and heart failure. Smoking allows less oxygen to the heart; increases blood pressure and heart rate; increases blood clotting; promotes plaque
buildup in the arteries; damages artery cells and other blood vessels; and restricts blood flow to the heart and other
organs –
greatly increasing the risk of heart attack.
HIV
Did you know smoking cigarettes takes more years of life than HIV itself? Smoking with the human immunodeficiency virus, or HIV, increases the chance of developing cancer and lung conditions such as
COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease) and pneumonia.
Smoking can also impact the effectiveness of HIV medications.
Quitting smoking makes a difference. Quitting means improving HIV treatment, symptoms, and quality of life. As well as reducing your risk of long-term disease and premature death.
Last updated 2/8/2022 3:29 PM
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