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• Maternal Smoking May Hurt Infant Skin Most Before Birth Kate Johnson 

The risk for infant atopic eczema and dermatitis posed by maternal smoking is highest in the third trimester of pregnancy, according to a poster presented here at the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma and Immunology 2012 Annual Meeting.

"Our results indicate that maternal environmental tobacco smoke exposure impairs the immune response of the fetus, which facilitates the development of AEDS [atopic eczema/dermatitis syndrome]," note Miwa Shinohara, MD, PhD, a pediatric allergist from Kochi University in Japan, and colleagues.

"The mechanism is unclear, but we think it is antioxidant stress," Dr. Shinohara told Medscape Medical News. "Most previous studies have investigated the systemic immune effect, but we recently found a direct impact in the skin using a skin prick test," she said.

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Coffee Doesn't Affect Psoriasis Risk After All, Researchers Say 

soriasis because there are hypotheses in the past that caffeine might be an anti-inflammatory," said lead author Dr. Abrar Qureshi, an assistant professor of dermatology at Harvard Medical School in Boston.

"However, we found there was no association between coffee intake and the risk of psoriasis," he said.

These findings agree with other studies that found no association between coffee and this skin condition, the researchers noted.

The reason that there has been an association of psoriasis with coffee may have to do with smoking and alcohol, which are known risk factors for psoriasis, Qureshi said. In the study, those who drank the most coffee also drank the most alcohol and smoked, he said.

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Pregnant women beware: smoke exposure may cause infant skin condition (PDF) 

An abstract from the 2012 Annual Meeting of the American Academy of Allergy, Asthma & Immunology (AAAAI) suggests that smoke exposure during the third trimester of pregnancy may have the strongest impact on increasing the development of eczema after birth.

“A recent study demonstrated that environmental tobacco smoke exposure was significantly associated with an increased rate of eczema in the offspring, whereas another study found no association. We wanted to see whether a particular trimester might be associated with an increased occurrence of eczema in the offspring,” said first author Miwa Shinohara, MD, PhD.

The researchers enrolled a sample of 1,436 infants between the age of two and 18 months. Questionnaires were given to gather family history of allergic diseases, number of older siblings, the mother’s tobacco smoke exposure during and after pregnancy and the development of eczema as diagnosed by a physician.

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• Smoke Exposure Late in Pregnancy Might Boost Baby's Eczema Risk 

A mother's exposure to tobacco smoke during the last three months of pregnancy may increase the risk that her child will develop the allergic skin condition eczema during infancy, a new study suggests.

The study authors pointed out that it is already known that children whose mothers were exposed to tobacco smoke during pregnancy are at a higher than normal risk for developing asthma or respiratory infections. However, previous studies regarding the relationship between smoke exposure and eczema risk came up with mixed results.

To investigate the potential connection, the research team focused on more than 1,400 infants between the ages of 2 months and 18 months.

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• Supplements may help skin of smokers 

Antioxidants, vitamins and omega-3 fatty acids may help the skin of smokers to appear younger, U.S. researchers suggest.

Robert C. Spitale of Stanford University School of Medicine in California and colleagues say cigarette smoking is well-known to be associated with accelerated skin aging, cardiovascular disease and lung cancer, in large part due to oxidative stress.

"In this study, we explore the potential effects of commonly available oral supplements containing antioxidants, vitamins and omega-3 fatty acids on 11 smokers compared to 17 non-smokers," Spitale said in a statement. "At baseline and after 12 weeks of supplementation, metabolomic analysis was performed on serum by liquid and gas chromatography with mass spectroscopy. Furthermore, clinical parameters of skin aging was assessed by three dermatologist raters who did not know the subjects' age and smoking status."

The study, published in the journal Genome Medicine, found smokers who took the supplement had an increase in skin elasticity, but non-smokers did not enjoy the same benefit.

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Differential effects of dietary supplements on metabolomic profile of smokers versus non-smokers 

Background

Cigarette smoking is well-known to associate with accelerated skin aging as well as cardiovascular disease and lung cancer, in large part due to oxidative stress. Because metabolites are downstream of genetic variation, as well as transcriptional changes and post-translational modifications of proteins, they are the most proximal reporters of disease states or reversal of disease states.

Methods

In this study, we explore the potential effects of commonly available oral supplements (containing antioxidants, vitamins and omega-3 fatty acids) on the metabolomes of smokers (n=11) compared to nonsmokers (n=17). . . .

Conclusions

Additional future work may shed light on the specific mechanisms by which LCFAs can lead to increased glow, improved elasticity measures and decreased fine wrinkling in smokers' skin. Our study provides a novel, medicine-focused application of available metabolomic technology to identify changes in sera of human subjects with oxidative stress, and suggests that oral supplementation (in particular commonly available antioxidants, vitamin and omega-3 fatty acids), affects these individuals in a way that is unique (compared to nonsmokers) on a broad level.

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• Smoking Linked to Higher Rate of Psoriasis: Study 

Smokers are at higher risk of developing the autoimmune skin condition psoriasis than nonsmokers, a new study finds, possibly because smoking pushes the body's immune system into overdrive, one expert suggests.

The research doesn't directly prove that smoking causes psoriasis, and the wide majority of smokers would avoid developing the condition even if they faced an increased risk.

Still, the findings provide yet another reason for smokers to drop the habit, said study co-author Dr. Abrar Qureshi, an assistant professor of dermatology at Harvard Medical School. "It behooves us even more to advise individuals who are smoking to quit," he said, especially because psoriasis itself is linked to higher risks of diabetes and heart attacks. . . .

The study appears in a recent issue of the American Journal of Epidemiology.

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Buerger’s Disease 

Buerger's disease (thromboangiitis obliterans) is a nonatherosclerotic segmental inflammatory disease of small- and medium-sized arteries of the distal extremities of predominantly young male tobacco users. Early symptoms may include episodic pain and coldness in fingers, and late findings may present as intermittent claudication, skin ulcers, or gangrene requiring eventual amputation. Tobacco cessation is the cornerstone of treatment. Other modalities of reducing pain or avoiding amputation have not been as successful. This review summarizes in tabular form the types of treatment that have been used, including therapeutic angiogenesis.

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• Anti-smoking campaign targets women under 30  

WOMEN UNDER 30 are being targeted in a new anti-smoking campaign which emphasises the effects that smoking can have on looks.

The "I'll Quit When I'm 30" advertisements are targeted at the only growth market left in smoking in Ireland.

Some 40 per cent of women in the 18 to 30 category smoke as opposed to 29 per cent of the overall population.

A majority of women (56 per cent) in the poorest socio-economic groups in that age category smoke. As part of the campaign, which is timed to coincide with Ash Wednesday tomorrow, the Irish Cancer Society has also launched a leaflet entitled The Beauty of Quitting.

It emphasises that prolonged smoking can lead to premature wrinkles, yellowish skin and discoloured teeth.

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Plastic Surgeon Cautions Against Smoking Before Surgery - 

Concerned about studies that indicate a link between smoking and complications during and after breast augmentation, Boston, MA area plastic surgeon Dr. Michael Tantillo is urging women to kick their cigarette habits prior to surgical procedures. He's so concerned, in fact, that he's using Facebook to spread the word about the connection between smoking and surgical complications.

"Despite so many studies showing the risks of smoking, it's still a widespread habit," Dr. Tantillo says. "Many people do not even know about the potential affect it can have on surgery. To help spread the word on the risks of smoking when it comes to surgical procedures, I decided to use my Facebook Page (http://www.facebook.com/MichaelTantilloMD?v=wall) to call attention to an ABC News report on the correlation between cigarettes and surgical complications.

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Smoking and Risk of Incident Psoriasis Among Women and Men in the United States: A Combined Analysis 

The authors observed a graded reduction of risk with an increase in time since smoking cessation (Ptrend <0.0001). In this study, smoking was found to be an independent risk factor for psoriasis in both women and men. Psoriasis risk was particularly augmented for heavy smokers and persons with longer durations of smoking.

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• Smoking tied to higher psoriasis risk  

But most have studied people at only one time-point, which makes it hard to be sure the smoking came before the psoriasis.

So for the new study, researchers used data from three large, long-running studies of U.S. health professionals.

Of nearly 186,000 men and women followed for 12 to 20 years, 2,410 developed psoriasis during that time. And the risk was greater among both current smokers and former smokers.

People who were current smokers at the study's start were almost twice as likely as lifelong non-smokers to develop psoriasis. And past smokers had a 39 percent higher risk than non-smokers.

The findings, reported in the American Journal of Epidemiology, do not prove that smoking, itself, causes psoriasis in some people.

But it is clear that the smoking came before the psoriasis, said senior researcher Dr. Abrar A. Qureshi, of Harvard Medical School and Brigham and Women's Hospital in Boston.

Past studies have found links between psoriasis and both obesity and heavy drinking. But after accounting for those factors, the smoking-psoriasis link remained, Qureshi told Reuters Health.

"I think if there's one message, it's that for now, smoking seems to be a risk factor for new-onset psoriasis," Qureshi said.

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The relationship between basal and squamous cell skin cancer and smoking related cancers 

Background

We compared the risk of being diagnosed with smoking-related cancers (lung, oral cavity, upper digestive and respiratory organs, bladder, kidney, anogenital cancers and myeloid leukaemia) among people with squamous cell carcinoma (SCC) or basal cell carcinoma of the skin (BCC), with risks found in the general population using data from an Australian population-based cancer registry. . . .

Conclusions

Individuals with a history of SCC having an increased risk of developing smoking related cancers cancer suggests smoking as a common etiology. The relationship between BCC and smoking-related cancers is less certain.

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Smoking Linked to Skin Cancer in Women 

A new study has found a link between tobacco use and skin cancer.

The study found that women who had squamous cell skin cancer were more likely to have smoked than those who were free from the disease. And those who smoked at least 20 years were twice as likely to develop squamous cell skin cancer, a less aggressive form of skin cancer than melanoma.

Men who smoked had a modest risk for the two types of non-melanoma skin cancer -- basal cell and squamous cell cancer -- but the results weren't statistically significant, the study authors noted.

"We don't know why," said study lead author Dana Rollison, referring to the difference between women's and men's risk. Both men and women get a lot of exposure to the sun, the main risk factor for skin cancer, she noted.

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Case–control study of smoking and non-melanoma skin cancer 

Objective

To investigate the association between cigarette smoking and basal and squamous cell carcinomas (BCC and SCC) of the skin, a clinic-based case–control study was conducted in Tampa, FL. . . .

Cigarette smoking is more strongly associated with SCC than BCC, particularly among women.

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