Invited at the SISA conference in Bari, prof. Riccardo Polosa stressed the principle of risk reduction with nicotine-releasing combustion-free products to improve cardiovascular health
“Smoking is one of the most important risk factors for atherosclerosis”, so prof. Riccardo Polosa at the regional conference of the SISA (Italian Society for the Study of Atherosclerosis): he connected remotely from Seoul, where he was attending the 2023 edition of the annual GTNF conference.
A speech that stressed the need of more information among doctors and specialists of the healthcare systems: quitting smoking can result in a reduction of the atherothrombotic damage.
“However, it is important to understand a fact when talking about smoking: even today, nicotine is believed to play a major role in the developing of atherosclerosis” explains prof. Polosa “Nicotine does not cause atherosclerosis. In a survey conducted by SERMO on 1000 Italian doctors, it was found that 62% of the sample still think that atherosclerosis is caused by nicotine. The fact that 33% of the sample is made up of cardiologists is significant“.
“Unfortunately,” continues Polosa, “Quitting smoking is the main solution. However, the truth is that, even if people say they want to quit, they either don’t want to or aren’t able to say goodbye to smoking. E-cigarettes can help quitting smoking and this is confirmed by FDA, Cochrane review and many other randomized trials. It is therefore important to understand that these tools can reduce cardiovascular events.
There is a third way: reducing the risk with combustion-free products containing nicotine. It is obvious that we still need long-term studies to evaluate the potential and/or possible risk of these products, especially with regards to cardiovascular damage”.
