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Reliable estimates of the percentage of people with schizophrenia who smoke are hard to come by and the range is 40% to as high as 80% compared to 25% for the general population. People with schizophrenia are heavier smokers than the general population too, over a pack a day. They usually have much less money to spend on cigarettes. In Ontario on disability benefits an individual would have $516 a month living allowance and a pack a day would cost $125 each month. I know people with schizophrenia who regularly choose cigarettes over food near the end of the month when they run out of money.
Cigarette addiction causes many difficulties for people with schizophrenia. Hospitals and group homes are usually completely nonsmoking because they are health care providers and cigarettes are a health hazard. Family members throw up their arms in frustration when their loved one spends all their money on cigarettes. Some families use cigarettes as a bribe to make sure their loved one takes their medication. As North America becomes a nonsmoking continent the coffee shops, restaurants and shopping malls that people with schizophrenia used to patronize have become nonsmoking environments and people with schizophrenia spend less time in such community environments because every hour or so they need a "nicotine fix". It is generally accepted that the reasons why people with schizophrenia smoke so much is more complex than just the addictive nature of cigarettes. It is probably more fair to look at cigarettes as a herbal medication for schizophrenia. Researchers have been studying the nicotinic receptors (also referred to as the acetylcholine receptors) in the hippocampus, which are involved in many cognitive processes, like attention, memory, and sensory gating. These are cognitive abilities that people with schizophrenia often score lower on then the general population, possibly because they have fewer acetylcholine receptors in the hippocampus. Nicotine reverses memory impairment in people with schizophrenia according to Dr. Edward Levin who has been studying nicotinic receptors at the Duke University Medical Centre in North Carolina for the last six years. Six months ago there were a number of articles in newspapers across the continent on how nicotine improves sensory gating in people with schizophrenia, which is the ability of the brain to screen out extraneous sensory input, like background noise. This deficit in sensory gating is a considered to be a major difficulty for people with schizophrenia. And Nicotine is known to generally facilitate increased attention and vigilance.
The copyright of the article Cigarettes and Schizophrenia in Schizophrenia is owned by . Permission to republish Cigarettes and Schizophrenia in print or online must be granted by the author in writing.
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