GynoFiles

Tobacco for cancer prevention should be intuitive, but it's not an easy proposition, so here's what we can do to help. First begin to understand what we are talking about. It's not an uncommon outcome to get cancer from smoking. Breast cancers occur double the frequency of lung cancer. Still almost 1/5 of all cancers in the US are smoking related lung cancers. If you smoke you increase your risk of lung cancer by about 30 times, but any tobacco exposure increase risk. Here’s how you address your efforts to quit smoking ASK your physician regarding options, discuss what you have tried, discussed what you think may work Take Your Physician’s advice Seek out resources on line such as self help workbooks, brochures, and books Do consider the use nicotine replacement products such as patches, gums, etc Do consider medication strategies such as buproprion and varenicline; even nortriptyline and cytion have worked Address your smoking with behavioral s...

Getting women to not smoke is a primary objective of their gynos. Anything that helps patients smoke less is also a boon to health. Less smoking because of smoking bans as well as less smoking due to electric cigarettes has been shown to help women. In a study funded by the Thrasher Foundation with the Lung Foundation in the Netherlands, they have found 10% less preterm births just seen smoking bands have been instituted! A large American company now will be making the first American made eCigarettes. Previously they have all been from China, but by being manufactured here does that mean they are safer? The Chinese made eCigarettes are not regulated in content, and thus the chemicals and percentages of nicotine varies greatly. A lot of the marketing says they're only harmless water vapor. The FDA has a definition of eCigarettes on line . Medscape points out that this is completely untrue and vaporized propylene glycol, nicotine, as well as flavoring agents that are vaporized by a...

If you want a baby, both of you need to put out the cigarettes. Smoking is the least recognized contribution to infertility. Smokers have at least double the rate of infertility based on getting pregnant within one year. About 1/3 of the population smokes. Oddly, recent studies of infertility shows that even passive smoking affects your ability to get pregnant. We have known for a long time that smokers go through an earlier menopause due to earlier depletion of all their viable eggs. This translates in to a 1-4 year earlier menopause. But we now know that baseline FSH rates creep up on smokers years before this and in fact the impact on ovulation and thus fertility sets in much earlier. No one has quite worked out if this is due to nicotine or the other products in cigarettes, but it is thought to be the other factors, so perhaps vaping wouldn’t cause as much effect. Sperm counts and parameters in the semen analysis are worse, but no studies actually have proven male infertility...

E-Cigarettes or electronic cigarettes to those of us who don't smoke, can be inhaled and that is not called smoking it is called vaping. The exotica marketed to the former smoking group is growing in appeal and variety, and was highlighted in a story in Wall Street Journa l. But what if you are pregnant, would vaping be safe? E-cigs use technology to turn nicotine, without tar and other byproducts, into inhale-able vapor. If you want to even give off the ambiance of being a smoker in the dark, or from a distance, the very vampy-est vaping devices have LED lights on their ends. Smokers say they "work" just like any cigarette, without some of the tobacco smell, and no ashtray mess. The FDA regulates all tobacco products, whether with smoke or without. Doctors and the medical field have not established safety. Smoking traditional tobacco cigarettes is not safe in pregnancy and many fetal problems have been linked to this including actual birth defects, premature labor...

Some weight loss going into a pregnancy is good. Normalizing your weight before pregnancy can lead to lower risks of diabetes, lower risk of c-section, lower risk of retaining weight, and healthier babies.  Usually the healthy behaviors recommended are stopping smoking and increasing exercise. For those with diabetes, the better your sugar control is, regardless of your weight, the fewer miscarriages and birth defects women will have. Normally weight loss itself will help prevent type 2 diabetes, but oddly quiting smoking doubles your risk of acquiring type 2 diabetes. Perhaps this is because of weight gain, but we aren't sure. Not a reason not to quit, but a good reason to get your weight managed after quitting smoking. Too much weight loss going into pregnancy, or during pregnancy,  is potentially harmful to you and your baby. Too much dieting could lead to calcium, iron or folic acid deficiencies which all are associated with pregnancy problems that may be both maternal an...

The newest study looking at the effect of smoking on menopause confirms what we have been saying for years: smokers have earlier menopause. It has something to do with the direct toxic effect of smoke on the ovaries. The study didn’t actually prove that stopping smoking helped this much. In fact the opposite: most studies looked at “ever smokers” and notice the same earlier menopause trend as noted by Dr. James Lacey Jr of the Beckman Research Institute in Duarte California . Interestingly, early menopause has been tied to about a 2% greater risk of dying, and the risk is mostly associated with increased cardiovascular diseases. Breast, liver and uterine cancers are actually less in smokers: presumably due to their lower overall estrogen numbers. But ovarian hormones do so much as we know that women with premature surgical removal of the ovaries will lead to increased overall mortality, coronary heart disease dementia, osteoporosis and other cancer mortality. Premature menopause, ...

Often the things we do have wide reaching unintended consequences. As my smokers roll their eyes and hold up their hand in that classic crossing guard stop pose, and try to tell me, don't say another word against smoking, we know we've heard it all. But no, Danish researchers have just discovered that there is something about quitting smoking that raises your risk for being diagnosed with hypothyroid. It may be that thyroid function tests, tests of thyroid antibodies,  and an ultrasound exam  of your thyroid can uncover these issues. So get into your gyno or closest endocrinologist to check out your gland. And if this is really a risk of quitting smoking, maybe there is a sliver lining to this cloud. So don't be thinking you shouldn't quit so you won't have this thyroid issue, but be thinking: ah ha, is this why quitting smoking makes it easier to gain weight and harder to lose weight than ever before? Maybe if we look more closely at this phenomenon we'll be a...

Another gyno lecture about stopping to smoke, and yes, we can help you do that. But bottom line, if you didn't realize why you are having increasing problem with over active bladder, urge incontinence or mixed incontinence disorders, well for those of you who still smoke are all linked to smoking. Of course smokers have more frequent and more forceful coughs too, so the challenge to the bladder integrity is there constantly. Tobacco side products and nicotine lower estrogen, which may also have the long term consequences of weakening your pelvic floor. So eCigs probably won't help you solve this problem, you really should quit! There probably is also a direct link with nicotine and contractions of the bladder wall called detrusor contractions.Studies also reveal that more urinary retention occurs in smokers, and it can be a source of infections and lower abdominal discomfort.   Cystometrics at womenshealthpractice.com can help you make a diagnosis. And some of these changes...

Everyone knows they should quit smoking tobacco, but how? And we are all afraid of the tension that comes with stopping smoking, and we've discussed calming down while stopping smoking . About one in 5 women smoke. Gynos have work to do. We know about the connection of smoking and lung cancer,heart disease, and of course addiction to an expensive habit;  but do we women realize it's connected to fetal death and stillbirths, sudden infant death syndrome, reduced fertility, hip fractures and cervical cancer? In additon nicotine has been linked to the pain of fibrocystic breast disease. These are the real concerns of real women, and all these attributable to smoking: preventable! Now there are also links between smoking and depression. What's the cause, the chicken or the egg? Did depressed people begin to smoke, or does smoking somehow induce depression? If you want to quit here are some pointers. Try Aversion therapy: focus on all the bad things you know about smoking, re...

Stopping smoking is a challenge. But it's sill considered a NEW YEAR and there are even more ways to try to quit than ever! Gums, patches, prescriptions, distractions, are all popular ways to do it, and we won't be getting away from them too soon. And quitting success means that the good things you got from smoking (ok, "good" or the so called Smoker's Paradoxes aren't really 'good', in that they kept you smoking) need to be addressed. What I mean is there are some health effects you will be missing sorely and to really quit successfully you need to address those health issues one by one. Calming those fears, and setting up ways to relax without the lighting up is important. One is going to be weight. Nicotine increases metabolism, and you'll need a strategy to boost it without nicotine or the calm of the new year will definitely be broken! The FDA is warning people on Varenicline (Chantix) that some serious neuropsychiatric events can occur in ...