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Passive Smoking can Increase Kidney Disease Risk

by Iswarya on March 9, 2019 at 10:28 AM

New study finds that exposure to secondhand smoke is associated with the development of chronic kidney disease (CKD) among nonsmokers. The findings of the study are published in the Clinical Journal of the American Society of Nephrology.


The study provides additional rationale for strengthening public smoking restriction policies and supporting educational programs about the harms of secondhand smoke.

‘Secondhand smoke exposure at home or workplace is still prevalent despite legislative actions forbidding public smoking. People exposed to secondhand smoke even a few days per week have more than 50 percent raised risk of developing kidney disease.’

Cigarette smoking and exposure to secondhand smoking have been linked with higher risks of various diseases, but their effects on kidney health are unclear. A team from Korea led by Jung Tak Park, MD, Ph.D. (Yonsei University College of Medicine) and Jong Hyun Jhee, MD (Inha University College of Medicine) conducted a study to investigate the association between secondhand smoke exposure and CKD in adults who had never smoked.

The study included 131,196 never-smokers who participated in the Korean Genome and Epidemiology Study from 2001 to 2014.

Participants were classified into three groups based on the frequency of secondhand smoke exposure as assessed with survey questionnaires: no-exposure, less than three days per week of exposure, and 3 or more days per week of exposure.

Participants with less than three days per week and those with 3 or more days per week of exposure had 1.48-times and 1.44-times higher odds of having CKD when compared with participants with no secondhand cigarette exposure.

In an additional analysis, the researchers assessed the risk of receiving a new diagnosis of CKD over an average follow-up of 8.7 years among 1,948 participants. Compared with the no-exposure group, the risk for developing CKD was 66% and 59% higher in participants with 3 or more days per week and less than three days per week of exposure, respectively.

"Secondhand smoke exposure at home or in the workplace is still prevalent despite legislative actions prohibiting public smoking. This exposure was found to be clearly related to CKD, even with less-frequent amounts of secondhand smoke exposure," said Dr. Park.

Source: Eurekalert

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