Childhood maltreatment, especially emotional abuse and neglect, are prevalent in migraine patients, U.S. researchers found. Dr. Gretchen E. Tietjen of the University of Toledo Medical Center and colleagues recruited a cross-sectional survey of headache clinic patients with physician-diagnosed migraine at 11 outpatient headache centers. Childhood maltreatment was assessed using the Childhood Trauma Questionnaire, a 28-item self-reported quantitat ... Jump to full article >>

Former smokers have a greater risk of developing diabetes than smokers or nonsmokers. But researchers say that’s due to the pounds people tend to gain after quitting. Smoking raises the risk of diabetes, but new research indicates that — at least in the short term — kicking the habit increases the risk even more. The problem is not really quitting smoking. It’s the pounds most people pack on when they give up cigarettes, ... Jump to full article >>

Children exposed to secondhand tobacco smoke are at increased risk for lung cancer later in life — even if they never smoke themselves, researchers said. That risk is also modulated by genetic variation in a gene involved in innate immunity, according to Curtis Harris, MD, of the National Cancer Institute in Bethesda, Md., and colleagues. The findings come from a study in the December issue of Cancer Epidemiology, Biomarkers & Preventi ... Jump to full article >>

New research provides evidence that the average cigarette is crawling with germs, including bacteria that cause respiratory disease. But as one spokesman for a tobacco company pointed out, the authors of the new study aren’t sure what, if any, hazard the germs pose. And exposure to bacteria is nothing new: Microbes surround us every day of our lives. Still, the findings raise plenty of questions, said study lead author Amy R. Sapkota.  ... Jump to full article >>

Researchers in the US found that exposure to tobacco in the womb and to lead during childhood was linked to a particularly high risk for Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in children, suggesting that while we tend to focus on treatment for ADHD, eliminating such exposures might prevent the condition in many hundreds of thousands of children. The study was the work of senior author Dr Robert Kahn, a physician and researcher at Cinci ... Jump to full article >>

Smoking bans have made the air healthier in bars and restaurants, but may have made the air just outside the establishments more hazardous, University of Georgia researchers have found. Nonsmoking diners and imbibers sitting in outdoor patios or sidewalk seating areas connected to the bars or restaurants are picking up doses of secondhand smoke, the scientists found. In fact, nonsmokers who volunteered to sit in the outdoor seating areas had lev ... Jump to full article >>

Cigarettes are “widely contaminated” with bacteria, including some known to cause disease in people, concludes a new international study conducted by a University of Maryland environmental health researcher and microbial ecologists at the Ecole Centrale de Lyon in France. The research team describes the study as the first to show that “cigarettes themselves could be the direct source of exposure to a wide array of potentially p ... Jump to full article >>

When, more than a decade ago now, smoking bans began to take effect around the world, researchers and public health officials feverishly collected data demonstrating the health benefits: lower levels of respiratory illness were reported among bar workers from Dublin to San Francisco after indoor smoking bans took effect, saliva tests revealed lower levels of nicotine concentration in hotel and restaurant workers once smokers were chucked outside ... Jump to full article >>

Some tobacco researchers have argued that the European Union should remove its ban on a form of low-nitrosamine smokeless tobacco referred to as Swedish ‘snus’. This argument has developed in to an international debate over the use of smokeless tobacco as a measure of harm reduction for smokers. Leading authorities in the USA have firmly stated that there is no safe tobacco – a message which does not allow for any discussion of ... Jump to full article >>

Researchers have uncovered copies of sensitive internal documents destroyed by a Canadian tobacco company that could boost efforts by provincial governments suing the industry over health costs linked to smoking. The documents destroyed by Imperial Tobacco Canada reveal the firm had scientific data decades ago showing that cigarettes were addictive and caused cancer. “This evidence suggests that the industry wasn’t sharing absolutely ... Jump to full article >>