Effects of Habitual Tobacco Smoking on Reactive Hyperemia in the Human Hand

The purpose of this study was to test the hypothesis that habitual smoking of tobacco cigarettes reduces reactive hyperemia in peripheral areas of smokers who are at low risk of having atherosclerotic vascular disease. This was achieved by a cross-sectional comparison of post-occlusion hyperemia in the hand circulation of female cigarette smokers and nonsmokers in the 20- to 40-yr age range. Epidemiologic evidence indicates that sclerotic lesions are unlikely in the upper extremities of females in this age range. The right hand of a subject was maintained in a water bath at 32 degrees C while mean blood flow velocity (V) in the radial artery was measured before and after occlusion periods of 1 and 5 min. The 5-min period elicited maximal reactive hyperemia. Following both periods of occlusion the percent increase in V was less for smokers (P less than .02). Also, the absolute increase in V following 5 min of occlusion for the smokers was less than that of the nonsmokers (P less than or equal to .05). These results indicate that habitual cigarette smoking reduces peripheral vasodilatory reserve in young smokers. The fact that sclerotic lesions are unlikely in the present subjects points to a microcirculatory rather than a macrocirculatory effect.