Pathophysiological Impact of Cigarette Smoke Exposure on the Cerebrovascular System with a Focus on the Blood-brain Barrier: Expanding the Awareness of Smoking Toxicity in an Underappreciated Area

Peter Mazzone, William Tierney, Mohammed Hossain, Vikram Puvenna, Damir Janigro and Luca Cucullo
Additional contact information
Peter Mazzone: Department of Pulmonary Medicine, Cleveland Clinic Lerner College of Medicine, E 100th St, Cleveland, OH 44106, USA
William Tierney: Case Western Reserve University, 10900 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, OH 44106, USA
Mohammed Hossain: Cerebrovascular Research, Cleveland Clinic, 9500 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, OH 44195 USA
Vikram Puvenna: Cerebrovascular Research, Cleveland Clinic, 9500 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, OH 44195 USA
Damir Janigro: Cerebrovascular Research, Cleveland Clinic, 9500 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, OH 44195 USA
Luca Cucullo: Cerebrovascular Research, Cleveland Clinic, 9500 Euclid Ave., Cleveland, OH 44195 USA

IJERPH, 2010, vol. 7, issue 12, 1-16

Abstract: Recent evidence has indicated that active and passive cigarette smoking are associated, in a dose-dependent manner, with dysfunction of normal endothelial physiology. Tobacco smoke (TS) may predispose individuals to atherogenic and thrombotic problems, significantly increasing the risk for ischemic manifestations such as acute coronary syndrome and stroke. Despite the strong evidence for an association between smoking and vascular impairment, the impact of TS exposure on the blood-brain barrier (BBB) has only been marginally addressed. This is a major problem given that the BBB is crucial in the maintenance of brain homeostasis. Recent data have also shown that chronic smokers have a higher incidence of small vessel ischemic disease (SVID), a pathological condition characterized by leaky brain microvessels and loss of BBB integrity. In the brain TS increases the risk of silent cerebral infarction (SCI) and stroke owing to the pro-coagulant and atherogenic effects of smoking. In this article we provide a detailed review and analysis of current knowledge of the pathophysiology of tobacco smoke toxicity at the cerebrovascular levels. We also discuss the potential toxicity of recently marketed “potential-reduced exposure products”.

Keywords: tobacco smoke; alternative; blood-brain barrier; central nervous system; inflammation; endothelial cells; white blood cells (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2010
References: View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/7/12/4111/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/7/12/4111/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:7:y:2010:i:12:p:4111-4126:d:10351

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().