Nicotine addiction: A women's health crisis
(ARA) - Women account for about 20 percent of the world's 1 billion smokers, and 17.4 percent of adult women in the U.S. smoke. Cigarette smoking kills more than 173,000 women in the United States each year. In addition to the risks both men and women face from smoking, women are at risk for a unique set of complications, including certain cancers and problems with fertility and pregnancy.
A cycle of addiction
Even with all these risks, many women continue to smoke cigarettes. This may be because cigarettes contain a very addictive chemical called nicotine.
"Nicotine is highly addictive, and smoking should be treated as a chronic, relapsing medical condition," explains Carol Southard, RN, MSN, and tobacco treatment specialist with the Northwestern Memorial Physicians Group at the Center for Integrative Medicine and Wellness.
"Seeing your health care provider is an important first step and can be a good source of support to discuss options to help you stop smoking. There are seven FDA approved medications to help people quit smoking. Medications constitute an important cessation intervention, and it is recommended that clinicians should encourage every patient willing to make a quit attempt to use medication and counseling treatments. By using some of the medications, you may be able to at least double your chance of quitting," adds Southard.
Overcoming the urge
When smokers try to quit, they may experience withdrawal symptoms that cause them to slip up and have a cigarette.
People trying to quit can:
* Work with a health care provider to set up and stick to a quit plan. Discuss the option of using tobacco dependence counseling and medication treatments, which may be more effective than either alone.
* Ask friends and family to help them stay away from cigarettes and "triggers" that make them want to smoke.
It's never too late to try quitting
At any stage of life, smokers can decrease their health risks by quitting. Also, women who quit smoking before becoming pregnant or trying to become pregnant can reduce the risk of infertility, miscarriage, low birth weight and infant heart defects.
One study that examined female nurses between the ages of 30 and 55 across the U.S. from 1976 to 2004 shows that quitting smoking is beneficial to a woman's health. Some examples from this study of the potential impact of quitting on a smoker's health include:
* 20 years after quitting smoking, a woman's overall risk of dying may decrease to the level of a nonsmoker.
*Within five years of quitting smoking compared with continuing to smoke, a woman's risk of dying may decrease by 13 percent.
* Within five years of quitting smoking compared with continuing to smoke, the excess risk of death from coronary heart disease decreases 62 percent; death from cerebrovascular disease (stroke) decreases 42 percent and death from lung cancer decreases 21 percent.
* Within 10 years of quitting smoking compared with continuing to smoke, the risk of dying of respiratory disease decreases by 18 percent.
To learn more about quitting smoking, visit www.mytimetoquit.com for resources including a useful checklist to make it easier to talk to a doctor about quitting.
This information is courtesy of Pfizer Inc.
Courtesy of ARAcontent