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Smokers: Don't Read This

You've all heard that smoking is bad for your health. There is a warning label on every pack of cigarettes and on every advertisement. The media continues to report ways in which smoking negatively affects health. We know that people who smoke live five to 10 years less than people who have never smoked. Smoking has been directly linked to lung cancer. Beyond the lungs, almost all tissues and body systems are affected by tobacco use.

If that's not enough, we can add to the list an increased risk among smokers for:

• cardiovascular disease


• depression


• osteoporosis and bone fractures


• delayed healing of wounds


• degeneration of the discs in the spine

But wait! There's more. Several studies have shown that smoking increases the risk of low back pain. Of course, whenever there is this much bad news over one item, there can be conflicting reports. For example, some researchers question whether or not smoking is the problem. They suggest that smokers tend to have jobs or economic backgrounds that are the real risk factors for back pain.

An organization called the National Spine Network (NSN) decided to take a look at this issue. The NSN collected information about back pain patients from 23 different health care facilities in the United States. More than 25,000 people were included, making this one of the largest studies on back pain and smoking ever done.

The results showed that smokers who have low back pain are younger than nonsmokers and more likely to have severe pain. Smokers report many more symptoms of depression. Smokers also have longer recovery times from surgery of any kind. These differences were significant across gender, age, and educational levels.

The bottom-line bad news is that people who smoke have poorer health outcomes and take longer to heal from surgery compared to nonsmokers. This is especially true for smokers who are depressed. The good news is that both smoking and depression are treatable. Today's new medications and programs make these problems much easier to overcome than in the past.

References: Molly T. Vogt, PhD, et al. Influence of Smoking on the Health Status of Spinal Patients. In Spine. February 1, 2002. Vol. 27. No. 3. Pp. 313-319.

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