Smoking can be good for you

Abstract

Smoking is without doubt one of the greatest causes of avoidable illness and death in the modern world. Most well known is the relationship between smoking and numerous cancers, cerebrovascular and cardiovascular disease. Smoking and most especially nicotine, are, however, sometimes beneficial in certain diseases, including Parkinson's, Alzheimer's, allergic alveolitis, nausea and vomiting of pregnancy, pre-eclampsia, fibroids, carcinoma of body of uterus, ulcerative colitis, pyoderma gangrenosum, aphthous stomatitis and ulceration, pemphigus, herpes simplex and acne. In the immensely justifiable enthusiasm to discredit this dangerous activity, the mechanisms behind these beneficial effects tend to have been un-discussed or ignored. It is the aim of this paper to spur interest in the reasons for these effects. If the mechanisms are elucidated, therapeutic advances may be possible.

Increased risk of preterm births among women with uterine leiomyoma: a nationwide population-based study

“…The impact of these unmeasured factors may vary. For example, a lack of control for smoking would not have explained the positive findings because, in medical literature, maternal smoking has either been inversely (Baron, 1996;Wolf et al, 2004;Templeman et al, 2008) or unassociated (Marshall et al 1998;Wise et al 2004) with the risk of fibroids, and positively associated with the risk of LBW and preterm birth (Horta et al, 1997;Chiolero et al, 2005). However, a lack of control for maternal body mass index, nutritional status and alcohol consumption might be a concern because they are positively Continued associated with both uterine leiomyoma (Wise et al, 2004;Terry et al, 2007) and adverse birth outcomes (Lim et al, 2007;O'Leary et al, 2009).…”

Variation Over Time in Preventable Hospitalization Rates Across Counties

“…County-level variation in PQIs could reflect variation in factors such as discharge diagnosis coding, 4 comorbid illness, access to healthcare, patient behavior, and the quality of primary care services. [5][6][7] PQI definitions are considered to have a high degree of face validity. 8 Diabetes and asthma are two prevalent conditions for which adherent patients with access to good primary care should be able to prevent most hospitalizations.…”

Modulation of long-term potentiation in the hippocampus by pharmacological approach: A novel strategy for the development of cognitive enhancers

“…Paeoniflorin (Figure 2(b)), a component of peony root, significantly reversed the suppressive effects of scopolamine and pirenzepine on LTP, suggesting that it may have the potential to treat spatial cognitive impairment caused by cholinergic dysfunction. The nicotinic acetylcholine receptor plays an important role in learning and memory, and there is evidence indicating that tobacco smokers have a lower risk of developing AD [35]. However, the use of tobacco is definitely not an ideal approach for memory enhancement because of its addictive properties.…”