Does nicotine contribute to depression. How does smoking affect anxiety and mood. What are the mental health benefits of quitting smoking. How can smokers with mental health issues quit successfully. What are effective strategies for stopping smoking.

The Complex Relationship Between Nicotine and Depression

Many people wonder about the connection between nicotine use and depression. While nicotine itself does not directly cause depression, research has uncovered concerning links between smoking, vaping, and mental health issues. Understanding this relationship is crucial for those looking to improve their mental wellbeing.

How Nicotine Affects Brain Chemistry

Nicotine interferes with certain chemicals in the brain, altering mood and cognitive function. When smokers go without a cigarette, they often experience irritability and anxiety. Smoking provides temporary relief from these withdrawal symptoms, leading users to associate cigarettes with stress relief. However, this cycle can mask underlying mood disorders and exacerbate anxiety over time.

The Prevalence of Depression Among Smokers

Studies have found that smokers are more likely than non-smokers to develop depression. A 2019 JAMA study revealed that current e-cigarette users have double the odds of receiving a depression diagnosis compared to those who have never vaped. Frequent vaping was associated with even higher odds – 2.4 times greater – of having depression.

Smoking’s Impact on Anxiety and Mood

While many smokers believe cigarettes help them relax, the reality is quite different. Smoking actually increases anxiety and tension in the long run. The perceived calming effect is simply relief from nicotine withdrawal, not true relaxation.

The Cycle of Anxiety and Smoking

How does smoking perpetuate anxiety? When smokers haven’t had a cigarette in a while, cravings create feelings of irritability and anxiousness. Lighting up provides temporary relief, reinforcing the false belief that smoking reduces stress. In reality, it’s the effects of smoking itself that likely caused the anxiety initially.

Mental Health Symptoms Among Vapers

Research indicates that e-cigarette use is also associated with poor mental health. Current and former e-cigarette users report more days of poor mental health compared to those who have never vaped. Some researchers hypothesize that trace metals in vape liquid may contribute to depression symptoms.

The Mental Health Benefits of Quitting Smoking

Giving up cigarettes can have a profound positive impact on mental health and wellbeing. Studies consistently show improvements in mood and reductions in anxiety and depression among those who quit smoking.

Improvements in Anxiety and Depression

How does quitting affect mental health? Research demonstrates that when people stop smoking:

• Anxiety, depression, and stress levels decrease
• Quality of life and positive mood improve
• The dosage of some psychiatric medications can often be reduced

Comparing Quitting to Antidepressants

Remarkably, evidence suggests that stopping smoking can be as effective as antidepressants in improving symptoms of anxiety and depression. This underscores the significant impact that quitting can have on mental wellbeing.

Smoking and Mental Health Disorders

People with mental health conditions face unique challenges when it comes to smoking. Understanding these issues is crucial for developing effective cessation strategies.

Higher Smoking Rates Among Those with Mental Illness

Individuals with mental health disorders, including anxiety, depression, and schizophrenia, are much more likely to smoke than the general population. They also tend to smoke more heavily, which can exacerbate health risks.

Impact on Life Expectancy

How does smoking affect life expectancy for those with mental illness? Sadly, people with mental health problems who smoke die on average 10 to 20 years earlier than those without mental health issues. Smoking plays a major role in this significant difference in life expectancy.

Interactions with Psychiatric Medications

Smoking can interfere with the metabolism of certain psychiatric medications, including some antipsychotics and antidepressants. As a result, smokers with mental health conditions often require higher doses of these medicines to achieve the same therapeutic effect.

Strategies for Quitting Smoking

Quitting smoking can be challenging, but with the right approach and support, it’s achievable. Here are some effective strategies for those looking to stop smoking:

Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT)

NRT products like patches, gum, and lozenges can help manage cravings and withdrawal symptoms. These aids provide controlled doses of nicotine without the harmful chemicals found in cigarette smoke.

E-cigarettes as a Cessation Tool

While not without risks, e-cigarettes can be an effective tool for some smokers trying to quit. They allow users to gradually reduce nicotine intake while maintaining the hand-to-mouth habit associated with smoking.

Professional Support

Seeking help from NHS stop smoking services can significantly increase the chances of quitting successfully. These experts can provide personalized advice, support, and access to cessation aids.

Special Considerations for Mental Health Patients

People with mental health conditions may need additional support when quitting smoking. Here are some important considerations:

Medication Adjustments

It’s crucial for individuals taking antipsychotics or antidepressants to consult with their healthcare provider before quitting smoking. The dosage of these medications may need to be monitored and potentially reduced as smoking cessation can affect their metabolism.

Integrated Treatment Approaches

Combining smoking cessation efforts with mental health treatment can be particularly effective. This integrated approach allows healthcare providers to address both issues simultaneously, optimizing outcomes.

The Role of Vaping in Mental Health

As e-cigarette use continues to rise, it’s important to understand its potential impact on mental health. While some view vaping as a less harmful alternative to smoking, research suggests it may still have negative effects on mental wellbeing.

Vaping and Depression Risk

Studies have found that e-cigarette users have higher odds of experiencing depression compared to non-users. The reasons for this association are not fully understood, but may involve the effects of nicotine on brain chemistry or other compounds in e-cigarette liquid.

Potential Benefits for Smoking Cessation

Despite concerns, some mental health patients have successfully used e-cigarettes to quit smoking traditional cigarettes. When used as part of a comprehensive cessation plan, vaping may help some individuals transition away from more harmful combustible tobacco products.

In conclusion, the relationship between nicotine use and mental health is complex. While smoking and vaping are associated with increased risks of depression and anxiety, quitting can lead to significant improvements in mental wellbeing. For those struggling with both nicotine addiction and mental health issues, a comprehensive approach that addresses both concerns simultaneously may offer the best chance of success. As always, individuals should consult with healthcare professionals to develop a personalized plan for quitting smoking and improving their mental health.

Stopping smoking for your mental health

We all know that quitting smoking improves physical health.

But it’s also proven to boost your mental health and wellbeing: it can improve mood and help relieve stress, anxiety and depression.

Smoking, anxiety and mood

Most smokers say they want to stop, but some continue because smoking seems to relieve stress and anxiety.

It’s a common belief that smoking helps you relax. But smoking actually increases anxiety and tension.

Smokers are also more likely than non-smokers to develop depression over time.

Why it feels like smoking helps us relax

Smoking cigarettes interferes with certain chemicals in the brain.

When smokers haven’t had a cigarette for a while, the craving for another one makes them feel irritable and anxious.

These feelings can be temporarily relieved when they light up a cigarette. So smokers associate the improved mood with smoking.

In fact, it’s the effects of smoking itself that’s likely to have caused the anxiety in the first place.

Cutting out smoking does improve mood and reduces anxiety.

The mental health benefits of quitting smoking

When people stop smoking, studies show:

• anxiety, depression and stress levels are lower
• quality of life and positive mood improve
• the dosage of some medicines used to treat mental health problems can be reduced

Smokers with mental health problems

People with mental health problems, including anxiety, depression or schizophrenia:

• are much more likely to smoke than the general population
• tend to smoke more heavily
• die on average 10 to 20 years earlier than those who don’t experience mental health problems – smoking plays a major role in this difference in life expectancy
• need higher doses of some antipsychotic medicines and antidepressants because smoking interferes with the way these medicines work

Stopping smoking can be as effective as antidepressants

People with mental health problems are likely to feel much calmer and more positive, and have a better quality of life, after giving up smoking.

Evidence suggests the beneficial effect of stopping smoking on symptoms of anxiety and depression can equal that of taking antidepressants.

Tips to stop smoking

If you want to stop smoking, contact your local stop smoking service, which provides the best chance of stopping completely and forever.

Here are some ways to boost your chances of stopping smoking for good.

• Use stop smoking treatments like nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) or e-cigarettes.
• See an NHS stop smoking expert. It’s free and will increase your chances of quitting for good. You can talk about which stop smoking aids will work best for you, and they can provide additional support such as advice on coping with cravings.
• If you’re not as successful as you want to be, you’ll still have learnt something to help you next time. The more comfortable you are using the support available, the better prepared you’ll be for stopping completely next time.
• If you take antipsychotic medicines or antidepressants, it’s important you talk to your GP or psychiatrist before you stop smoking – the dosage of these medicines may need to be monitored and the amount you need to take could be reduced.

Page last reviewed: 1 March 2021

Next review due: 1 March 2024

3 ways vaping affects mental health

News Article

Topic

• Targeted Communities

Subtopic

• Mental Health

While it is well known that nicotine harms developing brains, including by making young people more susceptible to addiction, lesser known are the worrying connections between nicotine and mental health.

Though nicotine has not been found to directly cause mental health conditions, peer-reviewed studies reveal troubling links between vaping, nicotine, and worsening symptoms of depression and anxiety, as well as higher odds of having a depression diagnosis. Here are three ways vaping affects mental health.

Current e-cigarette users have double the odds of having a diagnosis of depression compared to those who have never vaped

Can vaping cause depression and anxiety?

According to a 2019 JAMA study of nearly 30,000 current e-cigarette users above age 18, frequent vaping is tied to even higher odds – 2.4X – of having a diagnosis of depression compared to never users.

The study also showed current e-cigarette users had 1.67X higher odds and former e-cigarette users had 1.52X higher odds of reporting at least one day of poor mental health in the past month compared to never users who reported no days of poor mental health. Researchers also believe that trace metals in vape liquid may play a role in the potential link between vaping and depression.

Vaping can worsen symptoms of depression

Does vaping make you depressed?

Based on the results of a 2017 study of nearly 2,500 ninth graders who had never previously used e-cigarettes or combustible tobacco in Los Angeles, those who used e-cigarettes at a higher frequency were associated with higher depressive symptoms. This also included feeling sad or having crying spells – a year later.

Nicotine use is significantly associated with higher levels of conditions like ADHD

Does vaping cause ADHD?

A 2019 study of U.S. college students found that vaping is significantly associated with higher levels of ADHD symptoms, and nicotine dependence was correlated with greater anxiety symptoms.

It is critical to both prevent teens and young adults from vaping or smoking and to help those who are addicted to quit as soon as possible. Not only does quitting break the addiction to nicotine and reduce health-related risks associated with tobacco use, it can also improve mental health. A 2014 meta-analysis showed quitting smoking is linked with lower levels of anxiety, depression and stress as well as improved positive mood and quality of life compared with continuing to smoke. This is Quitting^® is a free and anonymous quit resource from Truth Initiative that has helped more than 350,000 on their journey to quit vaping.

For free help with quitting vaping, text DITCHVAPE to 88709.

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Scientists have found out how smoking and depression are connected

Smoking can lead to depression, Israeli scientists say. Smokers are much more likely to experience depressive symptoms, and quitting the habit improves mental health.

Smoking is not only harmful to physical health, but is also associated with mental disorders, researchers from the Hebrew University in Jerusalem found out. The study was published in the journal PLOS ONE .

Smoking, including passive smoking, is one of the main risk factors for morbidity and mortality worldwide, the authors note. Almost 90% of smokers acquire this habit before adulthood, 98% before the age of 26.

Previous studies have shown that people with depression and other mental disorders are more likely to start smoking than mentally healthy people. In particular, many studies have noted that smokers have a much lower quality of life and more pronounced symptoms of anxiety and depression.

More recent data have shown that there may be an inverse relationship – smoking becomes a predisposing factor for mental problems, and quitting it is associated with a decrease in depressive symptoms.

Together with colleagues from Serbia, the authors of the work interviewed more than 2,000 students of Serbian universities.

As it turned out, smoking students were several times more likely to suffer from depression than their non-smoking peers.

In particular, at the University of Pristina, depression was observed in 14% of smoking students and only in 4% of non-smokers, and in the University of Belgrade – in 19% smokers and 11% non-smokers. Women were more likely to suffer from depressive symptoms.

In addition, regardless of economic or social status, students who smoke were also more likely to complain of depression and had lower mental health scores (energy, social functioning) than non-smokers.

“Our study confirms existing evidence that smoking and depression are closely linked,” says Prof. Hagai Levin. “It’s too early to say that smoking causes depression. But tobacco seems to have a negative effect on our mental health.”

The Israeli government is actively cracking down on smoking – as of 2020, cigarettes are banned from display in stores, warning labels on packs are increased to 65% of the pack size, and all tobacco products and e-cigarettes must be sold in the same packaging, without logos or display manufacturer’s brand.

Levin would like such measures to take into account the impact of smoking on mental health.

“I encourage universities to advocate for the health of their students by creating cigarette-free campuses where not only is smoking banned, but tobacco advertising is also banned,” he says. “Combined with policies to prevent, screen and treat mental illness, these steps will go a long way towards combating the harmful effects of smoking on our physical and mental health.”

Researchers suggest that the whole thing is the effect of nicotine on the activity of neurotransmitters.

In addition, other chemicals in cigarette smoke indirectly stimulate the release of dopamine associated with feelings of satisfaction, which ultimately leads to mood swings.

Students generally have more mental health problems than non-degree peers, researchers note. This is probably due to the stress caused by the strict academic requirements. The authors of the work suggest that depression can push them to smoke, and then, in turn, only aggravate their condition. The researchers hope that quitting smoking will allow students to improve their mental health, but this remains to be tested.

Previously, British geneticists drew attention to the fact that

smoking can provoke not only depression, but also schizophrenia.

Since the prevalence of smoking among people with depression and schizophrenia is generally higher than among the rest of the population, they decided to find out whether the diseases predispose a person to smoking or vice versa.

After analyzing the genomes of almost half a million Britons and comparing them with data on their diseases and lifestyle, they found that a genetic predisposition to depression is associated with an increased likelihood that a person will start smoking. However, no such association was found for schizophrenia. At the same time, smokers, even without a genetic predisposition, were more prone to depression and schizophrenia.

Smoking contributed to the development of schizophrenia and depression

British geneticists have found a causal relationship between smoking and the risk of schizophrenia and depression. Using a genome-wide association analysis, they showed that smokers were 2.27 times more likely to develop schizophrenia and 1.99 times more likely to develop depression. At the same time, feedback was also observed – but only for depression. An article describing the study was published in Psychological Medicine .

There are more smokers among people with mental disorders than among the healthy population. Due to the additional health problems that smoking causes (such as lung disease and cardiovascular disease), their life expectancy can be significantly reduced, so the nature of the relationship between smoking and mental disorders needs to be understood accurately. However, it is not always obvious and it is not possible to establish it exactly even with the help of studying biochemical mechanisms.

It is known, for example, that substances contained in tobacco inhibit the production of monoamine oxidase, an enzyme that breaks down monoamine neurotransmitters, such as dopamine. Antidepressants from the group of monoamine oxidase inhibitors have a related effect, from which it can be concluded that smoking could be used as a means of self-treatment in depression.

On the other hand, dopamine itself at high concentrations of nicotine in the body begins to be produced more strongly. Increased activity of dopaminergic neurons, in turn, is one of the obvious biomarkers of schizophrenia: this is why most of the drugs that stop the symptoms of the disease – antipsychotics – act specifically on dopamine. To show the connection between smoking and the development of mental disorders through the influence on the work of brain neurotransmitters, therefore, it is possible, but it will remain two-sided; in addition, smoking may well be a side variable.

Robin Wotton of the University of Bristol and colleagues tried to find a causal relationship between smoking and the risk of developing mental disorders using a genome-wide association search. To do this, they used the results of a recent study on genetic markers associated with smoking as a binary variable, which found 378 single nucleotide polymorphisms in a sample of more than 1. 3 million people.

After that they did their own research on the genomes of 462690 people who provided information on how much they smoke, how often, and their attempts to quit. In the end, the scientists were able to find 126 polymorphisms related to the duration of smoking, the number of cigarettes smoked, and whether people tried to stop (and also whether they succeeded).

Next, scientists used already known single nucleotide polymorphisms associated with the development of depression and schizophrenia (40 and 114, respectively). Scientists conducted a statistical analysis of the relationship between smoking and the development of mental disorders using Mendelian randomization methods – they evaluate the influence of genetic markers on the development of any trait as instrumental variables and help determine a causal relationship (with an eye to the fact that genetic factors are a variable random).

The analysis showed that smoking (both a binary variable and all studied indicators) is a risk factor for the development of both schizophrenia and depression (both p < 0.