Lighting up is a habit that wreaks havoc on your health, contributing to everything from cancer to cardiovascular disease.
Now, the skin disease psoriasis can be added to that list.
"This study was pretty clear -- smoking predisposes to psoriasis," says dermatologist Dr. Jan Dutz.
Psoriasis causes red thick scaly patches on the skin. It can be itchy and make those suffering with it very self conscious.
A recent study looked at almost 900 nurses with psoriasis over a 14 year period.
Compared with the nurses who never smoked, the risk of psoriasis was 37 per cent higher in former smokers and 78 per cent higher among current smokers.
"It took up to 20 years of not smoking for the risk of developing psoriasis to go back to normal," says Dutz.
Even exposure to passive smoke during pregnancy or childhood had an impact.
"This study showed that exposure to smoke, even in-utero, increased the relative risk of them developing psoriasis," Dr. Dutz explains. "The exposure to second hand smoke as a child also increased the risk."
Genetics, along with the environment and the immune system, are thought to play a role in psoriasis -- which may help explain the study's findings.
"We know that smoking exposes one to many toxic chemicals and amongst the effects of these toxic chemicals is the produciton of" free radicals" which are small molecules that can affect the immune system," says Dutz.
Stopping smoking may decrease those free radicals, one more incentive for those who are at risk for -- or who have psoriasis -- to butt out.
With a report from CTV British Columbia's Dr. Rhonda Low.
