PARIS, August 25 (Benin News) –
Smokers have a weaker heart than non-smokers, according to a study presented at the ESC 2022 congress of the European Society of Cardiology. The study found that the more people smoked, the worse their heart function was, although some functions were restored when people quit smoking.
“It is well known that smoking causes the arteries to clog, leading to coronary heart disease and strokes,” says study author Dr Eva Holt, of Herlev and Gentofte Hospital in Copenhagen, in Denmark. Our study shows that smoking also leads to a thicker and weaker heart.
“This means that smokers have less blood volume in the left chamber of the heart and less power to pump it to the rest of the body,” he explains. The more you smoke, the worse the heart works. The heart can recover to some extent if you stop smoking, so it’s never too late to quit.
According to the World Health Organization, tobacco kills more than eight million people each year. Smoking is responsible for 50% of preventable deaths among smokers, half of which are due to atherosclerotic cardiovascular diseases such as heart attack and stroke. The harmful effects of smoking on the arteries and arterial diseases such as myocardial infarction and stroke are well established.
Studies have also shown that smoking is associated with an increased risk of heart failure, when the heart muscle does not pump blood through the body as well as it should, usually because it is too weak or stiff. . This means the body is not getting the oxygen and nutrients it needs to function normally.
The relationship between smoking and the structure and function of the heart has not been thoroughly examined. This study therefore sought to determine whether smoking was related to changes in heart structure and function in people without cardiovascular disease, as well as the effect of changing smoking habits.
The study used data from the 5th Copenhagen City Heart Study, which looked at risk factors and cardiovascular disease in the general population. A total of 3,874 participants aged 20 to 99 without heart disease were recruited. A self-administered questionnaire was used to obtain information on smoking history and to estimate pack-years, ie the number of cigarettes smoked in a lifetime. A pack-year is defined as 20 cigarettes smoked every day for one year.
Participants underwent an ultrasound scan of the heart, called echocardiography, which provides information about its structure and function. The researchers compared echocardiographic measurements of current smokers to those of people who had never smoked, after adjusting for age, sex, body mass index, hypertension, hypercholesterolemia, diabetes and function. pulmonary.
The average age of the participants was 56 years old and 43% were women. Almost one in five participants was a current smoker (18.6%), while 40.9% were former smokers and 40.5% had never smoked. Compared to non-smokers, current smokers had thicker, weaker, and heavier hearts.
Increasing years of smoking was associated with decreased blood pumping. We found that current smoking and the accumulation of pack-years were associated with deterioration in the structure and function of the left cardiac chamber, the most important part of the heart,” says Holt. Additionally, we found that over a ten-year period, people who continued to smoke developed a thicker, heavier, and weaker heart that was less able to pump blood, compared to people who didn’t. never smoked and to those who quit smoking during this period.
“Our study indicates that smoking not only damages blood vessels, but also directly harms the heart,” he concludes. The good news is that it is possible to reverse some of the damage by quitting smoking.