• 11/14/2004
  • Eureka, CA
  • Times-Standard staff
  • Times Standard (www.times-standard.com)

If you’re serious about quitting smoking, take the challenge during the Great American Smokeout on Thursday. Held each year in November, the Great American Smokeout helps smokers quit cigarettes for at least one day, in hopes they will quit forever.

Quitting smoking kits will be available at several areas including local hospitals.

“The majority of patients we see in our department have tobacco health-related illnesses or complaints,” said St. Joseph Hospital’s Cardiopulmonary Director Jack Scott. He said these include Chronic Obstructive Cardiopulmonary Disease, emphysema and bronchitis, oral cancer and major lung disease.

“It is amazing how smoking still dominates the life and behavioral patterns for many people — it’s an addiction that’s obviously very hard to give up,” Scott said.

Smoking damages nearly every organ in the human body, is linked to at least 10 different cancers, and accounts for some 30 percent of all cancer deaths. And it costs billions of dollars each year.

“You can’t cure major damage that has already been done by smoking. But when a smoker quits smoking, it stops any further pulmonary deterioration. Within just an hour of smoking that last cigarette the body begins a series of changes — there is a difference of improvement immediately,” Scott said. “It’s not easy to stop smoking, but there are a variety of programs now available, as well as medication, that can help in the process of quitting.”

Cigarettes and cigarette smoke contain over 4,000 chemicals, including 43 known to cause cancer. Many of these chemicals are added in the processes of tobacco farming and cigarette production. The tobacco burns while a cigarette is smoked, exposing the smoker to these deadly chemicals, tars and gases.

Nicotine occurs naturally in tobacco and does not cause cancer, but it does keep many people addicted to smoking. Nicotine in cigarettes can be very addictive. Each puff of a cigarette delivers a concentrated dose of nicotine straight to the brain — and reinforces the need for the next puff. If you’re interested in quitting, Scott encourages you to think of a plan, including a method to quit smoking and a way to stay smoke-free.

Even after you’ve given up nicotine, you may still have the urge to smoke. Moving from one phase to the next, “deciding to quit, preparing to quit and following through,” requires careful thought and preparation. You can test your own need for nicotine with the interactive quiz found on the American Cancer Society’s website’s “Preparing to Quit” page at www.cancer.org

The American Lung Association also provides a smoking cessation support page that outlines the medical benefits from 20 minutes after you quit smoking to 15 years of overall healing of your body after you stop. Its website is at www.lungusa.org