Smoking - All Articles

FAQ
Smoking directly causes 12 different cancers (and contributes to your risk of many others) and increases the risk of heart disease, stroke, respiratory illnesses, type 2 diabetes, and many other health problems.
Nicotine triggers the brain’s reward system, which makes it highly addictive. This can lead to nicotine withdrawal symptoms if you stop using it. The drug also increases heart rate and blood pressure by triggering the release of adrenalin.
Quitting smoking can result in improved cardiovascular health, better lung function, lower overall risk of early death, and reduced risk of lung cancer over time. The younger you are when you quit smoking, the greater the benefit.
Nicotine replacement therapy, medication, and counseling can help you quit smoking. A procedure called transcranial magnetic stimulation may help in the short term. Doctors may recommend a combination of these approaches. Other resources include apps as well as free text and phone services.
Secondhand smoke doesn’t increase the risk of smoking-related problems as much as smoking cigarettes yourself. However, they can cause health problems that are similar to smoking, such as increasing cancer risk, especially in children.

David Mannino, MD
Medical Reviewer
David Mannino, MD, is the chief medical officer at the COPD Foundation. He has a long history of research and engagement in respiratory health.
After completing medical training as a pulmonary care specialist, Dr. Mannino joined the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) Air Pollution and Respiratory Health Branch. While at CDC, he helped to develop the National Asthma Program and led efforts on the Surveillance Reports that described the U.S. burden of asthma (1998) and COPD (2002).
After his retirement from CDC in 2004, Mannino joined the faculty at the University of Kentucky, where he was involved both clinically in the College of Medicine and as a teacher, researcher, and administrator in the College of Public Health. He served as professor and chair in the department of preventive medicine and environmental health from 2012 to 2017, with a joint appointment in the department of epidemiology.
In 2004, Mannino helped to launch the COPD Foundation, where he served as a board member from 2004 through 2015, chairman of the Medical and Scientific Advisory Committee from 2010 through 2015, and chief scientific officer from 2015 to 2017.
Mannino has over 350 publications and serves as an associate editor or editorial board member for the following journals: American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine, Chest, Thorax, European Respiratory Journal, and the Journal of the COPD Foundation. He was also a coauthor of the Surgeon General’s Report on Tobacco in 2008 and 2014.

Justin Laube, MD
Medical Reviewer
Justin Laube, MD, is a board-certified integrative and internal medicine physician, a teacher, and a consultant with extensive expertise in integrative health, medical education, and trauma healing.
He graduated with a bachelor's in biology from the University of Wisconsin and a medical degree from the University of Minnesota Medical School. During medical school, he completed a graduate certificate in integrative therapies and healing practices through the Earl E. Bakken Center for Spirituality & Healing. He completed his three-year residency training in internal medicine at the University of California in Los Angeles on the primary care track and a two-year fellowship in integrative East-West primary care at the UCLA Health Center for East-West Medicine.
He is currently taking a multiyear personal and professional sabbatical to explore the relationship between childhood trauma, disease, and the processes of healing. He is developing a clinical practice for patients with complex trauma, as well as for others going through significant life transitions. He is working on a book distilling the insights from his sabbatical, teaching, and leading retreats on trauma, integrative health, mindfulness, and well-being for health professionals, students, and the community.
Previously, Dr. Laube was an assistant clinical professor at the UCLA Health Center for East-West Medicine and the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA, where he provided primary care and integrative East-West medical consultations. As part of the faculty, he completed a medical education fellowship and received a certificate in innovation in curriculum design and evaluation. He was the fellowship director at the Center for East-West Medicine and led courses for physician fellows, residents, and medical students.

Robert Jasmer, MD
Medical Reviewer
Robert Jasmer, MD, is board certified in internal medicine, pulmonary disease, and critical care medicine. He is in private practice in Burlingame, California, where he specializing in interstitial lung disease, pulmonary infections, and obstructive lung disease. His favorite part of practice is the long-term personal relationships he develops with his patients.
Jasmer previously served as the associate program director of the Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine Training Program at UCSF, and has also directed the UCSF Pulmonary and Critical Care Continuing Medical Education program. He was also the codirector of the medical intensive care unit at San Francisco General Hospital for nine years. He has published more than 30 peer-reviewed research studies and written 11 books or chapters on various topics in pulmonary diseases and critical care medicine. In addition to reviewing for Everyday Health, Jasmer has also written for publications like MedPageToday.
Jasmer is married and has a daughter and twin sons. In his personal time, he enjoys spending time with his family, trying out new restaurants, playing tennis, and keeping up with his children's busy schedules.

Kelly Kennedy, RDN, LDN
Medical Reviewer
Kelly Kennedy is a licensed dietitian-nutritionist with over 14 years of experience in digital media. She previously managed and oversaw nutrition content, recipe development, meal planning, and diet and nutrition coaching at Everyday Health. She developed and reviewed various meal plans, books, slideshows, and online tools, and oversaw the creation of more than 500 unique recipes. She received her bachelor's degree from the University of Massachusetts, Amherst, and a master's degree from the State University of New York College at Oneonta.
Kennedy enjoys anything that takes her outside, from gardening and playing in the yard with her kids to hiking and even feeding her pet chickens.

Heidi Green, MD
Medical Reviewer
In her private practice, Dr. Green provides psychiatric consultative services and offers an office-based buprenorphine maintenance program to support recovery from opioid addictions. She enjoys offering lifestyle medicine consultation to those interested in maximizing their emotional and physical health by replacing unhealthy behaviors with positive ones, such as eating healthfully, being physically active, managing stress, avoiding risky substance use, improving sleep, and improving the quality of their relationships.
At the opioid treatment programs, Green serves as medical director, working with a team of counselors, nurses, and other medical providers. The programs provide evidence-based treatment (including buprenorphine, methadone, and naltrexone) for persons suffering from opioid use disorders (such as addictions to heroin, fentanyl, or prescription pain medications).
Previously, Green has worked in community health and mental health settings where she provided consultation to behavioral health teams, integrated care teams, substance abuse intensive outpatient programs, and a women’s perinatal residential program. She also enjoyed supervising residents in her prior role as assistant consulting professor to the department of psychiatry at Duke University School of Medicine. During her training at the UNC department of psychiatry, she was honored to serve as chief resident, clinical instructor of psychiatry, and psychotherapy supervisor.
Green is passionate about the years we can add to our life and the life we can add to our years through lifestyle medicine! She focuses on maintaining her own healthy lifestyle through work-life balance, contemplative practices, and eating a plant-based diet. She finds joy through a continual growth mindset, shared quality time with her partner, and time spent outdoors backpacking and mountain biking.

Michael S. Niederman, MD
Medical Reviewer
Michael S. Niederman, MD, is the lead academic and patient quality officer in the division of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Weill Cornell Medical Center in New York City; a professor of clinical medicine at Weill Cornell Medical College; and Lauder Family Professor in Pulmonary and Critical Care Medicine. He was previously the clinical director and associate chief in the division of pulmonary and critical care medicine at Weill Cornell Medical Center.
His focus is on respiratory infections, especially in critically ill patients, with a particular interest in disease pathogenisis, therapy, and ways to improve patient outcomes. His work related to respiratory tract infections includes mechanisms of airway colonization, the management of community- and hospital-acquired pneumonia, the role of guidelines for pneumonia, and the impact of antibiotic resistance on the management and outcomes of respiratory tract infections.
He obtained his medical degree from Boston University School of Medicine, then completed his training in internal medicine at Northwestern University School of Medicine, before undertaking a pulmonary and critical care fellowship at Yale University School of Medicine. Prior to joining Weill Cornell Medicine, he was a professor in the department of medicine at the State University of New York in Stony Brook and the chair of the department of medicine at Winthrop-University Hospital in Mineola, New York, for 16 years.
Dr. Niederman served as co-chair of the committees that created the American Thoracic Society's 1993 and 2001 guidelines for the treatment of community-acquired pneumonia and the 1996 and 2005 committees that wrote guidelines for the treatment of nosocomial pneumonia. He was a member of the American Thoracic Society/Infectious Diseases Society of America committee that published guidelines for community-acquired pneumonia in 2007. He was also the co-lead author of the 2017 guidelines on nosocomial pneumonia, written on behalf of the European Respiratory Society and the European Society of Intensive Care Medicine.
He has published over 400 peer-reviewed or review articles, and has lectured widely, both nationally and internationally. He was editor-in-chief of Clinical Pulmonary Medicine, is an associate editor of Critical Care and the European Respiratory Review, and serves on the editorial boards of Critical Care Medicine and Intensive Care Medicine. He has previously served on the editorial boards of the American Journal of Respiratory and Critical Care Medicine and Chest. For six years, he was a member of the Board of Regents of the American College of Chest Physicians, and in 2013, he was elected as a master of the American College of Physicians.
- Cigarette Smoking. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. September 17, 2024.
- Benefits of Quitting Smoking. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. May 15, 2024.
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