Are You Still Smoking? Not Good News in Lupus!

Although cigarette smoking is a health hazard for everyone, it's a special risk for people with lupus - who are at much greater risk for heart disease and stroke. Smoking may even make your lupus worse. So are people who are diagnosed with lupus more likely to quit smoking than people without the disease?

That's the question asked by researchers from the University of California at San Francisco. They presented their study at a recent meeting of the American College of Rheumatology scientific sessions.¹

In a study of nearly 1000 people with lupus, they found that the prevalence of smoking unfortunately did not change after they found out that they had lupus. The researchers concluded that counseling on quitting smoking should be an important part of management for people with lupus.

Why is that important? The answer came from Michelle Freemer MD, Assistant Professor of Medicine at the University of California, who participated in the study.

First, she pointed to rheumatoid arthritis - another autoimmune disease that is a "cousin" of lupus.

"There is limited evidence in rheumatoid arthritis that smoking affects your risk of getting the disease," she said. "And there is good evidence that smoking increases the severity of rheumatoid arthritis." Doctors think that it's because people who smoke have higher levels of a marker in the blood for the disease.

"Further, we know that when people smoke, toxic breakdown products of smoke can attach to DNA in your cells," she explained. That can make them form antibodies to DNA - and that's one of the hallmarks of lupus.

"So although it has not yet been shown statistically that smoking increases your risk of lupus - or the severity of lupus - it would not be surprising if someone shows that some day."

As if all that is not enough, here's more:

• Many people with lupus get spasm - tightening - of blood vessels in their hands in the cold. (That's called Raynaud's phenomenon.) This has been proven to get worse with smoking.
  
  
• Some people with lupus have inflammation in their lungs, although there may be no symptoms. Smoking increases your chances of making the problem worse - with lung disease caused by smoking.

So if you have lupus and you're still smoking, isn't it time for you to quit? You don't have to do it alone. Ask your doctor for help!