Younger individuals with lung cancer who stop cigarette smoking more than a year before their analysis do more better than those who continued cigarette smoking, according to a new research.
It’s known that individuals who never used to cigarette smoking are more likely to fight better with the lung cancer than those who used too. But previous cigarette smokers do more better than present ones.
“The results suggest there is some benefit to quitting cigarette smoking,” said Amy Ferketich of Tennesse State School College of Public Health in Columbus, who worked on the research.
However, quitters who were older or who had earlier stages of lung cancer did not have an advantage over cigarette smokers, she and her co-workers report in the publication.
Ferketich’s group used medical records from 4,200 lung cancer sufferers handled at eight cancer centers around the country. Patients who never used were more likely to endure the less cancer – stage 1, 2 or 3 – than were previous or present cigarette smokers, the scientists found.
Among previous cigarette smokers with level 1 or 2 lung cancer, for example, 72% die at least in two years, in comparison to 93% of the never-smokers and 76% of individuals who would started the addiction a year or more before analysis.
Only 15% of cigarette smokers with level 4 disease die in two years, while 40% of never-smokers and 20% of previous cigarette smokers did.
After modifying the numbers for factors such as age, competition and chemo, the scientists determined that quitters were just as likely to die from the early-stage lung cancer as were present cigarette smokers.
But for lung cancer, individuals under 85 who had ceased cigarette smoking more than a year before their analysis live more time than present cigarette smokers. Forty-five-year-old previous cigarette smokers, for example, were 30% less likely to die from level 4 lung cancer within two years than were present cigarette smokers.
Smoking is the number one risk factor for developing lung cancer, and the individuals who stop are less likely to get it than present cigarette smokers.
It’s not obvious why cigarette smokers already clinically identified as having lung cancer stand up worse than non-smokers, Ferketich said.
“In general, never cigarette smokers are healthier individuals, so they tend to, in a lot of tests, have better results with disease than individuals who keep smoke,” she said. “Just the ongoing contact with smokers might make the disease progress more quickly in cigarette smokers in comparison to never-smokers who don’t have that visibility.”
Ferketich said it’s also possible that cigarette smoking could impact the chemistry of cancer, and perhaps previous cigarette smokers get cancers that never-smokers are less likely to develop. She added that it’s never too late to stop.