Cancer Survivors
If you have been diagnosed with cancer and continue to smoke or use other tobacco products, you may believe it is too late to stop or there is no benefit to quitting. However its never too late to stop using tobacco. We hope you find the information below helpful.
Smoking Related Cancers
Smoking can cause cancer almost anywhere in your body, including the:5
- Blood (acute myeloid leukemia)
- Bladder
- Cervix
- Colon and rectum
- Esophagus
- Kidney and renal pelvis
- Larynx
- Liver
- Lungs, trachea, and bronchus
- Mouth and throat
- Pancreas
- Stomach
Men with prostate cancer who smoke may be more likely to die from prostate cancer than nonsmokers.5
Smokeless tobacco, such as chewing tobacco, also causes cancer, including cancers of the:7
How Can Smoking Related Cancers be Prevented
The most important thing you can do to prevent smoking-related cancer is not to smoke cigarettes, or to quit if you do. It is also important to avoid secondhand smoke.
Quitting smoking lowers the risk for 12 types of cancer: cancers of the lung, larynx, oral cavity and pharynx, esophagus, pancreas, bladder, stomach, colon and rectum, liver, cervix, kidney, and acute myeloid leukemia (AML).8
- Within 5-10 years of quitting, your chance of getting cancer of the mouth, throat, or voice box drops by half.8
- Within 10 years of quitting, your chance of getting cancer of the bladder, esophagus, or kidney decreases.8
- Within 10-15 years after you quit smoking, your risk of lung cancer drops by half.8
- Within 20 years after you quit smoking, your risk of getting cancer of the mouth, throat, voice box, or pancreas drops to close of that of someone who does not smoke. Also, the risk of cervical cancer drops by about half.8
Resources
Stopping Tobacco Use After a Cancer Diagnosis