Quitting smoking early gives you better chance of surviving lung cancer, Harvard study says

BOSTON - Quitting smoking early is associated with higher survival rates from lung cancer.

Researchers at Harvard's T.H. Chan School of Public Health looked at more than 5,000 patients being treated for the most common form of lung cancer.

They found that compared to never-smokers, those who still smoked had a 68-percent higher mortality, yet those who had quit before their cancer diagnosis had only a 26-percent higher mortality. That is, patients who never smoked had the best odds of survival but people who stopped smoking before their lung cancer diagnosis were significantly better off than current smokers.

And the longer patients went without smoking before diagnosis, the greater the survival benefit.

Lung Cancer

Mallika Marshall, MD

Mallika Marshall, MD is an Emmy-award-winning journalist and physician who has served as the HealthWatch Reporter for CBS Boston/WBZ-TV for over 20 years. A practicing physician Board Certified in both Internal Medicine and Pediatrics, Dr. Marshall serves on staff at Harvard Medical School and practices at Massachusetts General Hospital at the MGH Chelsea Urgent Care and the MGH Revere Health Center, where she is currently working on the frontlines caring for patients with COVID-19. She is also a host and contributing editor for Harvard Health Publications (HHP), the publishing division of Harvard Medical School.

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