Smokers Should Be Screened for Lung Cancer–Even If They Quit Long Ago | Hacker News Reader

Smokers Should Be Screened for Lung Cancer–Even If They Quit Long Ago

smithsonianmag.com

34 pointsBrajeshwar8 comments

This ties to an important fact about how cancer works.

A cell has a long journey to becoming cancerous. It involves cell damage that is imperfectly repaired. A cell once injured is therefore liable to become cancer, but may not take the next step for decades.

When you stop smoking, you stop injuring more cells. But the injured ones are still there. You can think of them as like little time bombs, waiting to go off. A process that is likely to take decades. So even decades later, you should worry.

We convinced large numbers of people to stop smoking. Yay, us! We told them that smoking causes cancer. We were right. But we didn't go around advertising, "If you've been a smoker, you're never getting rid of your increased risk." Because that would have been demotivating.

Maybe we should have still been honest? Then my brother-in-law wouldn't have been so shocked when he got lung cancer from a habit that he had quit some 20 years earlier.

> But we didn't go around advertising, "If you've been a smoker, you're never getting rid of your increased risk." Because that would have been demotivating.

Honestly, learning this makes me regret quitting smoking a bit.

Just a bit, though, because the main risk with smoking isn't cancer, it's emphysema.

My grandfather died of emphysema. He spent the last twenty years of his life struggling to breathe. It's a horrifying condition.

Quitting smoking is still a good idea because quitting does actually reduce your risk of getting cancer.

Yes it’s true that a former smoker may be at greater risk than someone who never smoked….but the risk is still far lower in ex-smokers than someone who continues to smoke…

And that’s not even getting into all the other horrific non-cancer medical problems that smoking leads to. I am NOT exaggerating when I say “horrific”. If you look at the amount of suffering these non-cancer smoking related diseases can cause….the term “horror” is indeed accurate.

If anyone is reading this thread. Please please quit smoking. If you need help then there are lots of resources out there to help you….

As a young, naive, trainee I met a guy once in a hospital who had smoked ONCE, turns out he had a rare condition that would cause severe vasoconstriction (his blood vessels tightened up, think why things like coffee, amphetamines, nicotine makes your hands cold). His capillary blood vessels however did not relax, developed clots, and he ended up losing his limbs. He dedicated his life to giving HS anti smoking talks.

I of course heard him and then after my shift had energy drinks, adderall, and a half pack of smokes. I don’t know that scare tactics work (at least for me) I need to experience getting my hand burned. I think many are like me. It’s not ideal. What I have found to work is motivating people, help them uncover their desire to live but it’s much more work and takes time. Time that most people won’t find anyone to have in our medical system.

What really did it for me was watching people in the hospital that can’t breathe and then struggling to go up stairs or swim. Oh man, they are struggling. Just at rest gasping for air while hooked up to supplemental O2. It’s wicked sad.

Beurger Disease https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/books/NBK430858/

According to the CDC:

> Cigarette smoking causes premature death: Life expectancy for smokers is at least 10 years shorter than for nonsmokers. Quitting smoking before the age of 40 reduces the risk of dying from smoking-related disease by about 90%

https://www.cdc.gov/tobacco/data_statistics/fact_sheets/heal...

So at least there is that. Although I bet starting as a teen makes things worse given how lungs are still developing.

A good reason for screening is the greatly increased viability of treatments for non-small cell lung cancer. (Small cell, you're still pretty much screwed.)

Not if you catch it early stage. With LDCT screening you can catch the cancer when it is very small and physically remove it.

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