It's never too late (or too soon) to stop smoking. Even smokers with coronary heart disease who suffer a heart attack or severe angina rapidly benefit from kicking the smoking habit, German investigators report.
Smoking cessation clearly improves the long-term prognosis of coronary heart disease, the authors explain in the European Heart Journal, but few studies have examined the short-term impact of quitting smoking.
The German team investigated smoking behavior among nearly 1,000 patients during three weeks of rehabilitation after they had suffered a so-called "acute coronary syndrome" event.
Data show that self-reported smoking was strongly associated with the occurrence of second coronary events over the following year. Smoking cessation was linked to a 40 percent reduction in the risk of second occurrences.
"The benefits of nonsmoking in cardiac patients are beyond controversy and might even be larger than reported from former studies," the investigators conclude. "Our study suggests that major beneficial effects of smoking cessation are expected even within the first year after acute manifestation of coronary heart disease."
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