Kim K, et al. - Experts resolved to gauge the tie-up between smoking cessation, post-cessation body mass index (BMI) change and risk of myocardial infarction (MI) and stroke in men. No prominent modification was illustrated in the protective association of smoking cessation with MI and stroke due to post-cessation BMI change.

Methods

• Using the National Health Insurance Service (NHIS) dataset, researchers performed a prospective cohort study.
• Data extraction took place from 2002 to 2013.
• A total of 108,242 men aged over 40 years without previous diagnoses of MI or stroke were categorized into sustained smokers, quitters with BMI gain, quitters without BMI change, quitters with BMI loss, and non-smokers, on the basis of the first (2002-03) and second (2004-05) NHIS health check-up periods.
• Herein, the body mass index change was defined as the difference of more than 1.0 kg/m² between the two health check-up periods.
• Follow-up was carried out from 1 January 2006 to 31 December 2013.
• Researchers used the Cox proportional hazard models to estimate hazard ratios (HRs) and 95% confidence intervals (HR, 95% CI), after adjustment for sociodemographic, health status and family health history.

Results

• In comparison with the sustained smokers, a marked reduction was noted in the risk of MI and stroke among both quitters with BMI gain (HR 0.33; 95% CI 0.16-0.70 for MI and HR 0.75; 95% CI 0.57-1.00 for stroke) and without BMI change (HR 0.55; 95% CI 0.37-0.83 for MI and HR 0.75; 95% CI 0.62-0.92 for stroke).
• However, findings did not disclose any prominent link between quitters with BMI loss (HR 0.91; 95% CI 0.43-1.91 for MI and HR 0.86; 95% CI 0.57-1.31 for stroke), respectively.
• Lower risk of MI (HR 0.37; 95% CI 0.32–0.43) and stroke (HR 0.68; 95% CI 0.64–0.73) was reported among non-smokers compared to the sustained smokers.