Give the gift of like this Valentine's Day

Hello bloggers!

Happy Valentine's Day!

In light of this month’s status as American Heart Month, the Center for Disease Control’s (CDC) Office on Smoking and Health has put out several resources to help folks stop smoking this Valentine’s Day. I
decided to dedicate today’s blog entry to warning you about how smoking affects your cardiovascular
health.

We’ve all heard over and over how important it is to stop smoking or to avoid smoking all together, so
why is it important to listen this time?

The time to quit is now.

The longer you smoke the more damage you cause to your body. If you quit smoking by age 30, your
health can improve, and could become almost as good as any non-smoker’s. Research shows that your
body will begin to heal the damage smoking has caused shortly after you stop.

What does smoking do to my heart and arteries?

Tobacco smoke contains over 7,000 chemicals, including formaldehyde (excuse me while I revel in my
science knowledge) which 1. Smells BAD. Like really bad. And 2. Scientists stopped using it to preserve
lab samples (think brains floating in liquid inside jars that mad scientists always have) because the stuff
is so bad for you.

Almost immediately upon inhaling tobacco smoke, the cells inside the inner walls of your arteries react
to the poisons in tobacco smoke. Your heart has to pump harder and faster. Your vessels and arteries
thicken and get narrower, making it harder to pass blood through. Your blood gets stickier, so it’s even
harder to pump it through your now narrow arteries. It gets harder to eliminate fats from your blood
stream. Plaque starts to build on your artery walls. The plaque can rupture, causing a blood clot that
blocks your artery. Your tissues may start to die without any blood supply. You could have a heart
attack or stroke. You could die.

See? Kind of a big deal.

Quitting can save your life.

Your risk for a heart attack drops significantly 1 year after you quit smoking, and after 2 to 5 years, your
chance of having a stroke could fall to the same as a non-smoker’s. You could live.

Need proof? Check this picture out.

After Pueblo, Colorado enacted a no smoking ban in workplaces and public areas, the number of people
hospitalized for heart attack dropped 41% in 3 years. That’s a big deal.

So what do I do about it?

To talk to someone about your options for quitting smoking, contact Holly Salsbury, the
Health Department’s Montana Tobacco Use Prevention Program director, at 433-2207 or
hsalsbury@richland.org. She can get you set up with useful information on smoking cessation
techniques and guide you through the quitting process.

The Montana Tobacco Use Prevention Program (MTUPP) provides a FREE cessation service, The
Montana Tobacco Quit Line. If you are thinking about quitting call the Quit Line at 1-800-QUIT-NOW.
The Quit Line offers up to 4 weeks FREE nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) and reduced costs of the
prescriptions Chantix and Bupropion. The trained staff offers up to five FREE counseling sessions that
will help you with the process of quitting.

And who doesn't like free?

That's all! Have a happy heart!

From my heart to yours,
Red