QuitSmokingNews.com

Quitting smoking may cause short-term problems, especially for those who have smoked a large number of cigarettes for a long period of time:

• Feeling sad or anxious: People who quit smoking are likely to feel depressed, anxious, irritable, and restless, and may have difficulty sleeping or concentrating.
• Gaining weight: Increased appetite is a common withdrawal symptom after quitting smoking, and studies show that people who quit smoking increase their food intake. Although most smokers gain less than 10 pounds, for some people the weight gain can be troublesome. Regular physical activity can help people maintain a healthy weight.

Yes. There are many reasons that people diagnosed with cancer should quit smoking.

For those having surgery or other treatments, quitting smoking helps improve the body’s ability to heal and respond to the cancer treatment, and it lowers the risk of pneumonia and respiratory failure.

Also, quitting smoking may lower the risk of the cancer returning or a second cancer forming.

Quitting smoking substantially reduces the risk of developing and dying from cancer, and this benefit increases the longer a person remains smoke free.

However, even after many years of not smoking, the risk of lung cancer in former smokers remains higher than in people who have never smoked.

The risk of premature death and the chance of developing cancer due to cigarettes depend on the number of years of smoking, the number of cigarettes smoked per day, the age at which smoking began, and the presence or absence of illness at the time of quitting.