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By Linda Carroll, Reuters Health [06/05/03]

While men and women both benefit from quitting smoking, women see bigger improvements in lung function, a new study shows.

Researchers found that women's breathing improved more than twice as much as men's after kicking the habit, according to the study published in the American Journal of Epidemiology.

Women may benefit from quitting more than men because they seem to be more susceptible to damage from cigarette smoking in the first place, according to Gail Weinmann, director of the Airway Biology and Disease Program in the Division of Lung Diseases at the National Heart, Lung, and Blood Institute, which sponsored the study.

"The message people should take from this study is that it's never too late to quit," Weinmann said in an interview with Reuters Health. "Quitting helps everyone."

For the multi-center study, researchers led by John Connett of the University of Minnesota, in Minneapolis, followed more than 5,300 middle-aged smokers for five years. All the participants in the study had mild or moderate chronic obstructive pulmonary disease (COPD).

COPD, which includes emphysema, is a gradual, progressive disease that makes breathing increasingly more difficult with time, Weinmann explained.

"Sometimes there is obstruction in the lungs, sometimes it's in the airways," she added.

COPD is the fourth most common cause of death in the United States. And smoking is the leading cause of COPD.

During the course of the study, 611 men and 313 women permanently quit smoking. Another 916 men and 592 women quit intermittently.

In the first year after quitting, women's lung function improved more than twice that of the men's. That difference leveled out some during the five years of the study.

Compared to smokers, those who quit lost less lung function during the course of the study. Women, though, actually gained lung function during the five years of study.

SOURCE: American Journal of Epidemiology 2003; 157:973-979.