Smoking Shortens Survival after Liver Cancer Surgery

A Chinese study found that heavy smokers who have hepatitis B face a higher risk of death and cancer recurrence after they undergo surgery for liver cancer.

Smoking affects more than lungs—the liver must metabolize more than 40 tobacco-related compounds and several of them are known to cause cancer in the liver. In this study, researchers followed 302 patients who underwent surgery to remove liver tumors and compared survival of smokers to nonsmokers.

Survival without recurrence of liver cancer was 34 months in nonsmokers and 26 months in current smokers. Even former smokers had lower survival rates that were similar to current smokers, probably due to the cumulative effects of years of smoking, according to the report published in January issue of PLoS One.

Source: www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles /PMC3893178/