This Is MS Multiple Sclerosis Community: Knowledge & Support

I am an MS patient with numbness and spastivity in my right arm. I am also an occasional smoker. One thing I noticed is that whenever I smoke, the spasticity in my arm shoots up. I know that smoking is a known vascular constrictor and quiting this bad habit is beneficial. Does this mean that spasticity has direct links with blood flow. Has anyone else observed the same in MS?

Yes!!! We saw great difference the first time he quite...he told me that he could wake up much more easily and that he had greater strength, I could see that from the way he walked. But our smoky friend isn;t easy to drop so he started again...Now he has quite for about three months and smokes a cigar once in a while. I haven't seen the previous great results but i think it's really helpful.

Smoking makes me feel tired so I imagine what it must do to someone who already is dealing with fatigue. I also believe it has to do with the blood flow.

Hi Taurus-

Smoking is a known endothelial disrupter, it reduces nitric oxide distribution and lowers O2 levels in the blood, constricting blood vessels. Smoking is also linked to faster MS progression, although the mechanism has never been understood within the autoimmune paradigm of MS, since smoking lowers immune function.

And yes, spasticity and clonus can be related to hypoxia (low O2 levels in the blood), even temporarily....this happens in people exposed to high CO2 levels, high altitude or other temporary hypoxic situations.

This is from a new paper in the Journal of Inflammation regarding new research into smoking, MS and CCSVI-


http://www.dovepress.com/getfile.php?fileID=7571
cheer

_________________
Husband dx RRMS 3/07
dx dual jugular vein stenosis (CCSVI) 4/09
dual stents placed 5/09
CCSVI in MS

Nicotine is the world's most powerful natural insecticide. Would you like to live in a field where they sprayed insecticide 20 times a day?

Well, you don't need to if you smoke 20 cigarettes a day....you are already putting insecticide into your lungs, arteries and brain all day long. Nicotine affects the neuromuscular system of insects causing them to go into convulsions and die.

For years it was thought that hypoxia/C02 was causing the arteries of smokers to clog up (especially the coronary arteries, which are very narrow to start with). There's no doubt hypoxia causes damage to the endothelium but a study in 2002 by Dr. Thomas Neunteufl from the University of Vienna in Austria, suggested the real culprit was nicotine:

Researchers administered 1 milligram of nicotine via a nasal spray or cigarette smoke to 16 healthy long-term smokers, and then used ultrasound to examine the endothelium after 20 minutes. Nicotine-containing nasal spray and cigarette smoke alike reduced blood flow inside the artery, the study found, with the cigarette smoke reducing blood flow only slightly more.

http://ffn.yuku.com/topic/12077/t/Nicot ... eries.html


Ironically, nicotine spray is recommended to smokers to help them quit.

Smoking 5 cigarettes a day doubles the risk of breast cancer in women. This can hardly be due to tobacco tar in the lungs! I believe nicotine is the main reason smokers have increased risk of cancer all over the body - throat, oesophagus, stomach, lungs (surprisingly, only 20% of smoking deaths is caused by lung cancer), liver, reproductive organs... no wonder 1 in 4 smokers dies in middle age.

If Dr. Neunteufl's findings are correct, it is likely to be nicotine that causes the arteries in the brain to narrow in smokers. Nearly as many smokers die from strokes as lung cancer. Surely it is nicotine entering the womb that causes so many birth defects, still births and infant mortality when the mother smokes in pregnancy.


gainsbourg

Here's another good reason to quit. Cigarette smoke contains acrolein. It's also known as vinyl aldehyde. It's a small, highly reactive and toxic molecule which cross links DNA with covalent bonds. Recall that DNA chains are normally held together by the hydrogen bonding between the A-T and C-G base pairs. By having a covalent linkage which is much stronger, one would expect that acrolein would interfere with gene transcription and also DNA replication during cell division.

Some other "goodies" in cigarette smoke: benzene, nitrosamines and formaldehyde.

NHE

Hi Taurus
yes I used to get a huge increase in spasticity and numbness, in my circulation to my limbs and in fatigue, immediately after smoking.
I finally gave up for good 6 years ago and I mean it when I say it was the best thing EVER to give up completely.

_________________
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Concussus Resurgo
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
RR-MS dx 1998 and Coeliac dx 2003
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Copaxone, Cymbalta. EPO, Fish Oils, Vitamin D3 2000 IU daily, Cal/Mag/Zinc, Multivitamin/mineral, Co-Enzyme Q10, Probiotics, Milk Thistle.