Download Nicotine patches to help smokers cut risks of surgery: new

Monday January 9, 2016
Nicotine patches to help smokers cut risks of surgery:
new study
Smokers will be offered free nicotine-replacement patches when they go on
the elective surgery waiting list in a new study funded by the ANZCA
Research Foundation.
If patients use the five-week course of patches to help them quit smoking
before surgery, they will cut their risks of wound and chest infections after
surgery.
“Smokers are twice as likely as non-smokers to develop pneumonia after
surgery and 40 per cent more likely to develop a wound infection,” said lead
investigator and specialist anaesthetist Dr Ashley Webb. “Wound infection
rates can be reduced if patients stop smoking at least four weeks before
surgery, and stopping smoking for eight weeks will significantly reduce the risk
of pneumonia.
“But as anaesthetists and surgeons often meet patients just a short time
before surgery, their ability to decrease complications by helping smokers quit
has previously been a bit limited.”
In the study, half the smokers on the waiting list for surgery at Frankston
Hospital, Victoria, will be offered printed quit advice and patches that will be
posted to them, while the other half will receive quit information only. The
study will compare the number of patients in each group who have quit by the
time of surgery and stay quit afterwards.
“Patients being on wait lists for weeks, months or even years is the cause for
a lot of community and political discontent, but as they exist, we should at
least use that time to develop ways to get patients in the best possible shape
for their approaching surgery,” Dr Webb said.
“Offering help with quitting smoking is one of the most effective ways to make
a difference for their operations. As 300,000 smokers have elective surgery in
Australia and New Zealand each year, there is the potential to make a big
difference.
“If the posted-patch program is shown to work, it could easily be adopted by
other hospitals and medical centres.”
Dr Webb’s previous research into how much patients understood about
smoking and surgery found that, while many knew of the general risks of
smoking, such as cancer and heart attack, few knew about the surgical risks.
“Lungs impaired by smoking are more prone to pneumonia, and wounds are
more likely to become infected because nicotine causes the vessels to
constrict, and the carbon dioxide from the cigarettes lowers the oxygen in the
blood.
“In addition, smokers live in a permanent state of immunosuppression
because of the way their body must struggle against all the harmful
ingredients in cigarette smoke.”
For more information or to request interviews, please contact ANZCA Media
Manager Karen Kissane on +61 408 259 369, +61 3 8517 5303, or
[email protected] Follow us on Facebook or Twitter @ANZCA.