1ST CITY CLINICAL HOSPITAL

It is difficult to find another such habit, about the dangers of which so much has been said and written. However, the vast majority of young people still view smoking as a harmless, and often attractive, trait. Undoubtedly, to a certain extent, a frivolous attitude towards smoking is a consequence of low awareness of the population about its consequences and miscalculations in health education. You can often hear an ironic remark from a young man: we heard, we know, three drops of nicotine kills a horse, but it’s a horse, and we smoke and nothing bad happens to us.

Why is so much attention paid to combating this addiction? Maybe doctors greatly exaggerate its harm? After all, there are many smokers among them... In fact, there is nothing easier than scolding bad habits and traditions, and it is very difficult to give them up, change your lifestyle, and not succumb to the temptation to smoke in the future.

There are more than 3,660 components in tobacco smoke, many of which are very important for the body, in particular for the cardiovascular system. Thus, nicotine, stimulating the vasomotor and respiratory centers of the brain, thereby causes spasm of blood vessels, damage to the walls of blood vessels and contributes to the onset of the formation of a sclerotic plaque, narrowing the lumen of the vessel. The increased release of norepinephrine by the adrenal glands under the influence of nicotine can be dangerous for individuals prone to cardiac arrhythmias. Nicotine increases the heart's need for oxygen and increases blood clotting, which promotes thrombus formation, particularly in the coronary arteries. Under the influence of nicotine, the number of heart contractions increases by 15-20%. Regular smoking constantly causes the heart to work with increased load and in an irrational mode, which ultimately leads to its premature wear.

Substances entering the blood from tobacco smoke inhibit the body's absorption of vitamins, in particular vitamin C, and its deficiency contributes to the deposition of cholesterol in the vessel wall. Another component of tobacco smoke - carbon monoxide (carbon monoxide) - has the ability to bind hemoglobin in the blood, forming a stable compound (carboxyhemoglobin), thus depriving it of the ability to perform its main function - to deliver oxygen to organs and tissues. Carbon monoxide inhaled through cigarette smoke has approximately 210 times greater affinity for hemoglobin than oxygen. Components of tobacco smoke contribute to increased levels of cholesterol and triglycerides in the blood, which are directly related to the development of atheroma sclerosis. Among regularly smoking men aged 45-49 years (“smoking experience” of about 30 years), mortality from coronary heart disease is 3 times higher than among non-smokers, and almost 1/2 times higher than among those who quit smoking. It is noteworthy that in women who smoke, the risk of developing myocardial infarction is 3 times higher than in non-smokers. An analysis of the causes of myocardial infarction in people under 35 years of age shows that over 2/3 of patients smoked 10 cigarettes or more per day. There is a clear connection between the number of cigarettes smoked and the incidence of cardiovascular diseases. Many smokers think that a pack of cigarettes a day is not that much. However, in reality, smoking exactly this amount of tobacco leads to a sharp increase in the risk of both cardiovascular and pulmonary diseases. Overall, it is believed that a quarter of all cardiovascular diseases are caused by smoking.

Smoking has a particularly unfavorable effect on people who acquired this bad habit in childhood or adolescence. They usually have the most pronounced “dependence” on smoking, and at the same time, their life prognosis, due to the fact that the negative effect on the body begins very early, and its duration is the longest, is the least favorable. According to some data, if a person starts smoking at the age of 15, then his life expectancy decreases by more than 8 years, for those who start smoking at the age of 25 and later - by 4 years. It is believed that in the United States alone, smoking is responsible for 325 thousand premature deaths annually.

Studies have shown that the most unfavorable prognosis for the life of a middle-aged man is the combination of smoking with arterial hypertension and elevated serum cholesterol levels. Unfortunately, many people are forced to quit smoking only by myocardial infarction. Alas, such late insight does not always help. However, the fact that even heavy smokers stop smoking when their health deteriorates convincingly demonstrates that the majority are quite capable of taking this step, and statements about the impossibility of quitting often indicate only a reluctance to give up this bad habit. In women, the combination of smoking and the use of contraceptives (birth control) is unfavorable, since this increases the risk of thromboembolism (blockage of blood vessels) and myocardial infarction. Smoking also contributes to attacks of chest pain. There is even the term “smoker's angina pectoris”.

However, despite doctors' warnings, millions of people around the world smoke. What are the reasons for this phenomenon? They are different and are associated both with a person’s age, his living conditions, and with mental characteristics. The motives for starting smoking among men and women are usually different. For children and adolescents, the first Cigarette is often associated with the natural curiosity of the child. The surprising thing is that, although the first try of smoking does not bring pleasure (unpleasant taste in the mouth, dizziness, nausea), for most it does not cause a persistent aversion to tobacco. Many gradually get involved and become “tobacco dependent”. Among teenagers, quitting smoking is often perceived as a sign of lack of masculinity, evidence of being a “mama’s boy” among them, one of the most offensive nicknames for a child. A significant reason for starting to smoke is the desire to seem like an adult, as well as the example of a smoking comrade, whose opinion the teenager takes into account. Fashion plays a big role in the spread of smoking among girls. A smaller chest volume, a more intense metabolism and lower body weight contribute to greater poisoning of the female body due to smoking compared to males. Yellow teeth, loose, wrinkled skin, faster aging as a result of adverse effects on the genital area - all this is only part of the negative effects of smoking on a woman’s body.

Among the reasons that contribute to the consolidation of the habit of smoking, it should be noted the development of reflexes associated with it, for example, smoking after eating, as a kind of dessert. A significant factor in the stability of this bad habit is the belief of many that smoking increases mental activity and calms people down. Nicotine and other components of tobacco have a unique effect on the nerve cells of the brain and its blood supply, which leads to a false feeling of an influx of new strength, a feeling of elation and calm. A desire to smoke again appears - this is how a habit is born, this is how a vicious circle is established, from which it is very difficult to get out.

The distrust of sick smokers to the doctor’s advice to quit smoking often leads to tragic results. For example, with obliterating endarteritis (narrowing of the arteries of the legs, leading to a deterioration in their blood supply), the consequence of smoking may be such a severe circulatory disorder that to prevent the development of gangrene and the death of the patient, it is necessary to resort to amputation. Unfortunately, sometimes a smoker becomes convinced that the doctor’s advice is correct when the irreparable has already happened. Here the philistine psychology is manifested: everyone smokes - and nothing happens, and if something happens, it won’t happen to me...

Young people involved in sports should remember that smoking, as a result of the destructive effect of tobacco on the main organs of a person, interferes with the achievement of high sports results. Of course, there are unique athletes with outstanding natural abilities who can show good results, despite the habit of smoking, but the life of such athletes is short-lived. The blocking of hemoglobin (10% or more) in smokers by carbon monoxide through the formation of carboxyhemoglobin leads to the fact that at the time of physical activity, when the supply of oxygen to organs and tissues is most necessary, they do not receive enough of it, and the athlete-smoker cannot reach his or her best potential : he experiences shortness of breath, like a person who is in a rarefied atmosphere at an altitude of more than 2 thousand m.

Finding a non-smoker in a smoky room leads to the fact that after an hour and a half, the level of nicotine in his blood begins to differ little from that in the blood of a smoking person. Thus, in a certain sense, he can be classified as a smoker, since he is a “passive” smoker. According to some reports, wives of smoking husbands live 4 years less than women whose husbands do not smoke.