The reasons to quit smoking are nearly to numerable to mention. The American Heart Association says that smoking is the number one preventable cause of death in America. Smoking causes nearly 20% of the deaths in this country and nearly all lung cancers are caused by smoking. Smokers live on average 13 years less than non smokers. This is only the mortality related bad news associated with smoking. Systemic and local problems arise from smoking that may indirectly or directly lead to disease or death. The good news is that the percentage of Americans that smoke has been on the decline now for over 15 years. The AHA also says that since 1965, nearly 45% of adults that smoked have quit. You could be one of the many that have been successful in this venture and see the incredible health benefits of doing so.
What are the oral health implications to smoking?
It is important to note that numerous studies have shown that smoking is a direct causation to disease. These studies have been created strategically to isolate certain demographics to remove other social or socio-economic factors from the results. In 1991 Bergstrom and Eliasson performed a study on dental hygienists who smoked and those that did not. The idea behind this was that hygienists would be the ones who are the most knowledgeable and most likely the segment of the population that would practice the best oral hygiene. What they found was a direct correlation between smoking and alveolar bone loss.
Haber and Wattles in 1993 performed a study where they found that the odds ratio for periodontal (gum) disease was nine times higher in smokers than in non smokers. They also found a significant increase in periodontal disease (14 times) in heavy smokers vs. non smokers. Several studies have been done to determine that smoking also increases recovery time and recovery success in dental surgeries, many of which were caused either directly or directly by smoking. Dental implants is another section of dental therapy that is adversely affected by smoking. Bain and Moy in 1993 studied over 2100 dental implants between smokers and non smokers. The implant failures were nearly double in smokers over non smokers.
Smoking will yellow teeth, cause bad breath and have negative social implications that can have a broad range. There are over 4000 chemicals found in cigarettes with over 200 shown to have adverse effects on our health. Many of these chemicals are proven mutagens and some are proven carcinogens.
The American Heart Association has resources to help you quit.