With so many dangers associated with smoking, especially the correlation between smoking and the development of lung cancer, it is amazing to see how many people continue to voluntarily take part in this activity! Why is it that these mostly mature, reasonably intelligent men and women of every nationality allow such a small object to have so much control over their lives? You’d think it would be easy to just say “NO” to this tiny little death machine, but in reality it just isn’t so.

Why? Because smoking is a habit and habits are hard to break. Interestingly even efforts to raise the price of a pack of cigarettes have failed to slow the demand. And even though they aren’t cheap, cigarettes are very easy to buy, which makes it even harder to break this habit.

Smoking is the number one contributor to lung cancer. Besides causing lung cancer, cigarette smoking can cause other health-related problems including emphysema, bronchitis, and heart disease. Combine cigarette smoking with excess weight, stress, and a sedentary lifestyle, and a person who smokes literally becomes a ticking time bomb.

Here are some interesting bits of information about smoking and lung cancer.

Any amount of smoking can ultimately cause lung cancer, but how long you have been smoking, how deeply you inhale, and how many cigarettes you smoke on a regular basis all impact the development of lung cancer. It goes without saying that people who smoke a pack or more a day and who have smoked most of their lives are significantly increasing the likelihood that lung cancer will develop.

Quitting smoking may not stop lung cancer from developing, but doing so still is highly advisable. You immediately lower your risk of developing lung cancer the moment you stop (but only when you stop for good). The body will go into repair mode within a day or two after you stop. It’s not possible to determine whether the damage that has been done internally can be corrected, but stopping is worth the gamble.

Women are just as much at risk of developing lung cancer from smoking as men are, assuming equivalent smoking patterns and history. When it comes to lung cancer, men generally get most of the attention. There are more cases of men with smoking-related lung cancer than there are women, but don’t let this statistic fool you. Women are in danger too. In fact, more women die each year from smoking-related lung cancer than from breast cancer.

Passive smoking can also cause lung cancer, even in people who do not smoke. Passive smoking is the same as inhaling second-hand smoke. If you smoke, be considerate to others who don’t. Don’t smoke in enclosed spaces such as homes or cars. This is especially important around small children who don’t even realize the dangers they’re being exposed to.

If a pregnant woman smokes, her unborn baby smokes too!

And finally smoking is the cause of 90% of the cases of lung cancer. That alone should keep you from starting!

The use of tobacco and its resulting nicotine addiction is responsible for killing more than 430,000 people each year in the United States, more people than die from car accidents, homicide, suicide, fire, alcohol, cocaine, heroin, and AIDS combined. Tobacco use in some form accounts for around one in three of all deaths from cancer in the United States. Smoking is responsible for 83% of all lung cancer deaths. Smoking also causes cancers of the mouth, larynx, pharynx, esophagus, kidney, bladder, pancreas, uterus, cervix, and some leukemia. Cigarette smoking also can cause lung diseases that can be just as serious as lung cancer. Smokers may develop chronic bronchitis, with their airways blocked up with mucous, forcing them to cough frequently; and, of course, smoking can lead to emphysema, making it difficult for the lungs to perform their function of supplying adequate oxygen to the body. People with these problems tend to tire more easily and this influences them to avoid getting the exercise they need to promote their health. Cigarette smoking is responsible for more than 65,000 deaths from chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD), which includes chronic bronchitis and emphysema.

Your heart is at risk. Smoking doubles the risk of heart attacks, and, in addition, is a major risk factor for peripheral vascular disease, which is the narrowing of the blood vessels that carry blood to the leg and arm muscles.

Cigarette smokers die much younger than nonsmokers. Based on data collected from 1995 to 1999, the Centers for Disease Control estimated that adult male smokers lost an average of 13.2 years of life and female smokers lost 14.5 years of life because of smoking. For smokers between the ages of 35 and 70 the death rate is three times higher than those who have never smoked.

Tobacco smoke is a major source of indoor pollution. Secondhand smoke causes about 3,000 lung cancer deaths every year among those who do not smoke, and also is a factor in up to 40,000 deaths related to cardiovascular disease for nonsmokers too. Exposure to tobacco smoke in the home increases the severity of asthma for children and is a risk factor for new cases of childhood asthma.

Tobacco is very bad for the reproductive health of a woman, leading to a reduction in fertility and an increased risk of having a miscarriage. If a woman who smokes conceives a child, she may face the possibility of having an early delivery or even a stillbirth. And women who smoke increase the chance that their baby will have a low birth weight.

See the future if you continue this path. If you would take a moment to think of yourself as getting any of the diseases promoted by a smoking and nicotine habit sometime in the future, note how painful it would be for you, both physically and psychologically. Think, for a moment, of how much unhappiness it would create for you and your loved ones, and how it would keep you from enjoying the more healthy life that is yours after you have become a permanent nonsmoker. It is important to fully understand and feel, both consciously and subconsciously, just how negative a nicotine habit is to your overall enjoyment in life so that your mind, both conscious and subconscious, knows, without any delusion, just how much intense suffering will come to you unless you change your course in life.

Now make that picture dimmer and less bright and move it away from you, and watch as it grows darker and smaller. Take a moment to see yourself free of your nicotine addiction in the future. Look at how much healthier you look and feel. You can breathe freely and enjoy the fresh air entering your lungs. Your skin is healthier and you look younger at an older age, while your clothes smell fresher and cleaner. You are totally free of all the physical problems smoking would have caused you. When thought about in this way, it is more pleasurable to not smoke. You?ve found other healthier ways to get pleasure and reward yourself. In fact, cigarettes are now truly disgusting to you. As you see yourself a tobacco-free person, notice, now, that you?re feeling fine, you?re so relieved, you?re so much more at peace, you?re so much happier, so much healthier, and now you?re freer to be who you really want to be. Notice how much more personally self-confident and filled with personal self-esteem you now look and feel.

You may not fully know this, but the positive changes that result from becoming a permanent nonsmoker come sooner and are more pervasive than you ever imagined, making smoking cessation more immediately rewarding for you. Twenty minutes after you have quit, your blood pressure drops back down to the level just before your last cigarette and the temperature of your hands and feet increase toward a more normal level. Eight hours after you have quit the carbon monoxide level in your blood will have returned to a normal level. Just 24 hours after you have stopped smoking, your chance of a heart attack will already be decreasing. In the following weeks your circulation will be improved and the functioning of your lungs, even as soon as several weeks to 3 months? time, will have improved by 30%. In subsequent weeks you will be able to look forward to other significant health improvements. Sinus congestion, shortness of breath, and coughing will have decreased. The cilia function within your lungs will return to normal, enabling you to deal with mucous and clean the lungs, and thus reduce any infection. One year after quitting, your extra risk of heart disease will be half that of someone who has continued to be smoker. After 5 years the risk of a stroke can be reduced to that of a nonsmoker. Ten years after quitting smoking your lung cancer rate will be half of that of someone who has continued to smoke, and your risk of cancers of the mouth, throat, esophagus, pancreas, kidney, and bladder will all have decreased. Fifteen years after you have quit and become a permanent nonsmoker your risk of coronary heart disease will have fallen to that of someone who does not smoke. A 35-year-old man who becomes a permanent nonsmoker will, on average, increase his life expectancy by 5.1 years. And, of course, the quality of his life will be greatly increased during all his years, no matter how long he lives. Even smokers who quit after age 50 substantially reduce their risk of dying early. The argument that it is too late to quit smoking because the damage is already done is just not true.

It is important for people to know that nicotine is as addictive as cocaine and heroin. As matter of fact, it works to create and maintain an addiction in a way that is similar to those drugs. The addictive nature of nicotine is created by its ability to release dopamine in the brain, a chemical that creates feelings of pleasure. This is similar to the physiological and psychological effects of both cocaine and heroin. Recent research has shown that there is also some chemical in cigarette smoke that reduces the level of monoamineoxidase (MOA), which plays a role in breaking down dopamine. This helps create an overall increase in dopamine and thus contributes to the desire to keep taking more nicotine.

Cigar smokers who inhale absorb nicotine as rapidly as a cigarette smoker, while those who choose not to inhale absorb a significant amount of nicotine through the lining of their mouth, as do those who use smokeless tobacco. Even though these smokeless users do not hurt their lungs because they do not inhale tobacco smoke, the nicotine from their habit is still very highly addictive and causes the heart to beat faster and their blood pressure to go up. Chewing tobacco hurts a person?s ability to taste and smell, often causes damage to gum tissue, and can even result in the loss of teeth. More seriously, chewing tobacco is full of cancer causing chemicals that can give people cancers of the mouth, pharynx, larynx, and esophagus. Many people who get these particular cancers were users of chewing tobacco. So powerful are the cancer-causing chemicals in chewing tobacco that even very young users get these cancers.

Nicotine?s effects are short-lived within the body, leading people to continually give themselves more during the day. Eventually, the continued use of nicotine leads to what is referred to as tolerance. The drug is no longer as effective as it was, and people need higher and higher amounts of it just to get the same physiological and psychological effects that they experienced earlier. That is why people tend to increase their usage of nicotine-delivering substances the more they have been using them.

There are even short-term effects related to tolerance. Nicotine disappears from the body in a few hours and some tolerance is lost overnight. Smokers often report that the first cigarettes of the day, newly introducing nicotine to the body after several hours of forced abstinence during sleep, have the strongest effect and are enjoyed the best. As the day goes on, and they smoke more and more cigarettes, tolerance is created, and each cigarette has less effect.

Nicotine also suppresses the production of insulin by the pancreas, which acts to raise blood sugar and causes the liver to release glycogen into the blood. In addition, cigarettes themselves are actually between 8% and 18% sugar, so smokers who puff a cigarette frequently during the day are actually given themselves blood sugar-raising hits throughout the day. All this contributes to smokers experiencing a slight sugar high from increased blood glucose. As a result of all of this many smokers also experience a lessening of appetite. This may explain why people gain weight after stopping smoking. They are trying to maintain their prior elevated glucose level, which was found to be pleasurable. Any craving that a new nonsmoker might experience is most noticeable in the morning and mid-afternoon, when low blood sugar is no longer blocked by smoking.

Nicotine is biphasic in nature. It can both stimulate and relax a person, depending on how they smoke. Nicotine doesn?t work in the body the same way alcohol does, but they both exhibit biphasic activity. People often become uninhibited and more excitable after drinking, while at other times they may become sedated and eventually fall asleep.

Cessation of nicotine intake results in withdrawal symptoms that strongly influence anyone trying to end their tobacco use to start consuming it again. These symptoms can include headache, irritability, restlessness, tiredness, feelings of depression, poor concentration, and anger and frustration. While the most powerful influence on withdrawal is the pharmacological effects of nicotine, many behavioral aspects affect the nature of the withdrawal symptoms. For many smokers, the sight, feel, and smell of a cigarette and the rituals involved in obtaining, handling, lighting, and smoking the cigarette are all strongly associated with the pleasure of smoking and when absent can contribute to psychological feelings of withdrawal. While nicotine gum and patches can act to alleviate the pharmacological aspects of withdrawal, some cravings may persist because of these missed behavioral aspects of smoking. This is a problem in quitting smoking that can be easily dealt with and greatly minimized through the use of hypnosis.

One of the clearest indicators of the power of the effects of nicotine is that while over two-thirds of all tobacco users want to stop using it only a small number are able to do so permanently. Each year, nearly 35 million people make a concerted effort to quit smoking. Only 20% of those trying succeed in abstaining for as long as a year and only a small percent of these are able to do so by using willpower alone. Less than 7% succeed in abstaining for more than a year. Most of those trying to stop start smoking again within days.

Over 90% of smokers who try to quit without seeking treatment fail, with most relapsing within a week. Most smokers take several attempts to quit before they finally succeed.

To reduce the risk of lung cancer and other related cancers that are caused by smoking, smokers need to stop smoking completely. It has been found that the amount of carcinogens inhaled remains high even as they cut back on the number of cigarettes they use. Research has shown that this even applies when smokers are supplementing their intake of nicotine with the use of patches. The reason this is true is believed to be that the smokers inhale more deeply on the fewer cigarettes they do smoke to feed their addiction and the nicotine patches made little difference in how long and deeply the users inhaled the smoke from their cigarettes. Thus, the patches made little difference in the overall amount of carcinogens introduced into their bodies by their smoking habit. The conclusion is that patches do not significantly decrease a smoker?s risk of cancer. Possible theories as to why this is so is that patches fail to provide the high that the smokers desire, nor do they provide a substitute for the enjoyment that people get from the act of physically enjoying a cigarette. Another reason may be addictive compounds found in cigarette smoke that aren?t in the patches.

Sometimes in life failure is not necessarily an indicator of the difficulty or even the impossibility of accomplishing something. It just tells you what doesn?t work. Fortunately, seeing a qualified certified hypnotist is effective for changing a smoker into a nonsmoker for life. Not only do they become nonsmokers, but they do so more easily and comfortably then they ever expected. With the new cooperation of their subconscious they are able to lose their desire to smoke cigarettes and cigars. There is some physiological discomfort during the withdrawal period following the cessation of tobacco use, but with hypnosis these effects can be mitigated and the period of discomfort shortened. Hypnosis is also able to greatly reduce and even eliminate any tendency to gain weight after smoking cessation. In my clinical practice, I typically see clients only once for complete and permanent smoking cessation.

The leading risk factor for lung cancer is smoking. More than 80% of lung cancers are due to cigarette smoking. The longer a person has been smoking and also the more cigarettes a person smokes a day, the greater the risk is for developing lung cancer. Not only are smokers vulnerable to lung cancer, but the people around them are at a greater risk as well due to breathing second-hand smoke. Non-smokers who are married to smokers are at a 30% greater risk than non-smokers who are married to non-smokers. Marijuana cigarettes may also increase the risk of lung cancer since they contain many of the same cancer-causing agents that tobacco cigarettes have and are inhaled more deeply.

Lung cancer most commonly begins in the cells that line your lungs. Smoking causes the majority of lung cancers — both in smokers and in people exposed to secondhand smoke. But lung cancer also occurs in people who never smoked. In these cases, there may be no clear cause of lung cancer. Doctors have identified factors that may increase the risk.

Lung cancer is one of the most common cancers in the world. It is a leading cause of cancer death in men and women in the United States. Cigarette smoking causes most lung cancers. The more cigarettes you smoke per day and the earlier you started smoking, the greater your risk of lung cancer. High levels of pollution, radiation and asbestos exposure may also increase risk.

Causes of Lung Cancer

Smoking: smoking remains the greatest risk factor for lung cancer. Your risk of lung cancer increases with the number of cigarettes you smoke each day and the number of years you have smoked. Quitting at any age can significantly lower your risk of developing lung cancer.

Diet: Scientists are studying many different foods to see how they may change the risk of getting lung cancer. However, any effect diet may have on lung cancer risk is small compared with the risk from smoking. Eating a lot of fat and cholesterol might increase risk of lung cancer. Drinking a lot of alcohol may raise risk as well.

Family History: Studies have found a chromosome that may be resposible for lung cancer. The chromosome can be inherited. If you have had lung cancer before, there is a chance you may develop another type of lung cancer.

Air pollution from vehicles, industry, and power plants can raise the likelihood of developing lung cancer in exposed individuals. Up to 1% of lung cancer deaths are attributable to breathing polluted air, and experts believe that prolonged exposure to highly polluted air can carry a risk similar to that of passive smoking for the development of lung cancer.

Symptoms of Lung Cancer

People often decide to visit the doctor only after they have been bothered by certain complaints over a period of time. Individuals who have lung cancer frequently experience symptoms such as the following:

Metastasis to the bones is most common with small cell type cancers but also occurs with other lung cancer types. Lung cancer that has metastasized to the bone causes bone pain, usually in the backbone (vertebrae), the thighbones, and the ribs.

Shortness of breath usually results from a blockage to the flow of air in part of the lung, collection of fluid around the lung (pleural effusion), or the spread of tumor throughout the lungs.

A cough that does not go away or gets worse over time should be evaluated by a health-care provider.

Chest pain is a symptom in about one-fourth of people with lung cancer. The pain is dull, aching, and persistent and may involve other structures surrounding the lung.

Wheezing or hoarseness may signal blockage or inflammation in the lungs that may go along with cancer.

More men and women die from lung cancer than any other cancers. Who is most susceptible to this disease? Nearly 70 percent of the elderly 65 and older will be diagnosed with this disease. Three percent of lung cancer cases have appeared in people younger than 45 years old.

Until the 1930s, cancer of the lungs was not as prevalent but still quite common. However, once there was an increase of tobacco smoking use, lung cancer cases rose drastically. As information and education circulates about the hidden dangers of smoking, lung cancer related deaths are beginning to see a decline. Despite all the education and the public awareness, it’s still a common human cancer. For women, breast cancer is no longer the number one killer. Lung cancer has exceeded breast cancer related deaths.

Lung Cancer Causes

Smoking - Most lung cancer related deaths (about 90 percent) have been associated with smoking. Each time a person smokes a cigarette, they increase their chances of getting lung cancer. Based upon doctors’ formula regarding the quantity of packs to the amount of years smoked, someone who has a 30 pack to year history has a greater chance to develop lung cancer. For those people who smoke two, three or more packs a day, statistics show that one in seven diagnosed will die from the disease. Cigarette smoking is not the only culprit to lung cancer. Cigar smoking and pipe smoking can also lead to the disease at a lower rate. Those who smoke cigars or pipe smoke are five times more likely to get lung cancer than a person who never smoked.

The smoke found in tobacco has over 4,000 element compounds. Many of these are cancer causing. Two key carcinogens are polycyclic aromatic hdrycarbons and nitrosamines. Once a person has given up tobacco use, lung cancer risks decreases every year. Normal cells will begin to grow and outnumber damaged lung cells. After 15 years of not smoking, lung processes and the threat of the disease gets close to that of someone who has never smoked.

Passive Smoking - What is passive smoking? This is when people who are in close quarters smokers breathe in the smoke filled air. Those who don’t smoke have a 24 percent likelihood to develop lung cancer if they live with a smoker. Nearly 3,000 deaths can be associated with passive smoking.

Asbestos Fibers - Mesothelioma and lung cancer through asbestos exposure is high. People who work in asbestos related fields and smoke dramatically increase their chances of getting a lung cancer connected disease. When compared with their non smoking counterparts, they have a 50 to 90 percent greater risk of getting lung cancer or other lung related illness.

Radon Gas - Radon gas has been documented to be the next leading cause in lung cancer deaths, killing anywhere from 15,000 to 22,000 people in the United States every year. Like asbestos exposure, radon exposure augments lung cancer risks. The gas is able to travel through soil. It can gain entrance into homes by the gaps found in its foundation, its drains and its pipes. Nearly one in 15 homes is found with dangerous level of radon gas according to the United States Environmental Protection Agency. Can a person tell if their home has high amounts of radon gas? Only by a kit. The gas cannot be smelled, nor can be it seen.

Genetics - It’s true that most cases of lung cancer can be linked back to smoking. However, not every smoker will get the disease. That means other factors like genetics could play a part behind the causes of lung cancer. Studies have revealed that cancer can and does occur in families that have smokers and nonsmokers. It would seem a gene can increase the vulnerability of smokers in getting lung cancer.

Lung Diseases - When a smoker or even non smoker has other lung diseases such as COPD (chronic obstructive pulmonary disease), they are at an increased risk to develop the disease even if they quit smoking and all the effects have worn away.

History of Lung Disease - People with a record of lung cancer are at a higher risk of developing it a second time. People who have survived a non-small cell lung cancers have a one to two percent risk to getting the disease a second time while those who have beaten small cell lung cancers have a six percent increase each year.

Air Pollution - The chances of getting lung cancer from air pollution is raised in individuals that breathe in polluted air every day. Pollution from cars, power plants and industrialized areas increases these risks. Yet, they only account for one percent of lung cancer related deaths. Experts have suggested that every day exposure to air heavily polluted can be compared to passive smoking.