There may be 35 million older Americans with undiagnosed lung disease due to cigarette smoking, a new study suggests. They don’t meet the criteria for a diagnosis of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), but they still suffer significant lung disease and impairment, the researchers report in JAMA Internal Medicine. “We think we can increase their…
Every year in the U.S. over 392,000 people die from tobacco-caused disease, making it the leading cause of preventable death. Another 50,000 people die from exposure to secondhand smoke. Tragically, each day thousands of kids still pick up a cigarette for the first time. The cycle of addiction, illness and death continues. What can be…
A significant knowledge gap about smoking cessation practices among perinatal substance abuse staff at a single center means pregnant women are often not being counseled about the dangers of tobacco and encouraged to quit, new research suggests. Perinatal substance abuse counselors from the Johns Hopkins Center for Addiction and Pregnancy in Baltimore, Maryland, fared significantly…
On Friday, March 28, 2014, researchers stated that bans on smoking in public and the workplace led to a 10 percent drop in premature births and in emergency asthma treatment for children. The evidence, based on the records of more than two million children, comes from 11 published investigations into the impact of local…
It isn’t rocket science that parents should not be smoking at home with children that suffer from asthma. A new study finds, that secondhand smoke may be counteracting the effects of the child’s asthma treatment. The study, published in the journal Chest, finds that the oxidants in cigarette smoke were shown to be capable…
Smoking rates are different from state to state. The percentage of people with asthma who smoke ranges from about 12% in Minnesota and Utah to about 32% in Kentucky. The states with the highest percentage of people with asthma who smoke are clustered in the Midwest and South regions. CDC’s National Asthma Control…
Screening smokers with spirometry for chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) picks up more cases than symptom-based detection, research suggests. The authors say the findings highlight the need for more screening in primary care, which is seldom used at present. “Despite current and updated GOLD [Global Initiative for Chronic Obstructive Lung Disease] guidelines…
BACKGROUND: Diagnosis of chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD) and its severity determination is based on spirometry. The quality of spirometry is crucial. OBJECTIVES: Our aim was to assess the quality of spirometry performed using a spirometer with automated feedback and quality control in a general practice setting in Switzerland and to determine the prevalence of…