How to Quit Smoking and Handle Craving

No Smoking Day is observed every year on the second Wednesday of March to encourage people over the world to quit smoking. No Smoking Day 2022 falls on March 9.

The main purpose of this day is to spread awareness about the harmful health effects of tobacco consumption through cigarette and other modes.

Smoking or chewing tobacco is one of the worst habits one can adopt. The health risks are known to all but still thousands of youth, between 12 to 17 years of age, start smoking each day. Some start it out of curiosity and others might just want to look like grownups.

Effects of Smoking:

• Cough and throat irritation
• Bad breath and bad smelling clothes
• Patchy skin and discoloration of teeth
• Serious fetal conditions
• Heart diseases and Lung cancer

Over the time, more serious conditions may develop, including health problems like heart disease, bronchitis, pneumonia, stroke, and many types of cancer, out of which, oral cancer being quite common.

No matter what your age is or how long you’ve been smoking, your health benefits will begin as soon as you quit.

How to quit smoking?

In order to quit smoking, firstly you need to be firm that you want to quit smoking. Once decided, do not be lured by others. It is very hard to quit smoking; after all, the nicotine in cigarettes is a powerful addictive drug. But with the right approach, you can do it. You’ll need   lot of patience and, yes, willpower to quit this habit. It won’t go in a day and it will gradually improve.

If you want to quit tobacco but are confused how to do it, join m-cessation programme of Ministry of Health and Family Welfare (MoHFW).

Any tobacco user willing to quit tobacco can give a missed call on 011-22901701 for registration. You can also e-register yourself by filling your mobile number and e mail ID through http://www.nhp.gov.in/quit-tobacco.

Thereafter, a two-way SMS process begins, wherein the registered user will be sent a welcome QUITNOW SMS, immediately from the short-code allocated through National Informatics Centre viz.5616115. This will be followed by more SMSs, some of which will request reply back. An exclusive email ID “quittobacco@gov.in’ has been formulated for purposes of sending mailers for promotion of the project as well as to inform people at large regarding the ill effects of tobacco use at regular intervals.

How to Handle Cravings

You won’t be able to avoid all tobacco use triggers, so it is important to make a plan for how to handle cravings. Remember, cravings typically last for a few minutes. It might be uncomfortable, but try to wait it out. Make a list of things you can do to distract yourself, like:

• Call someone. You don’t have to do this alone, lean on the people you trust to distract you.
• Wait 15 minutes. Challenge yourself to read a magazine, listen to music, chant or play your favourite game for 15 minutes. Cravings only last a few minutes!
• Take a walk or jog. If you do not have the time, try some deep breathing. Physical activity, even in short bursts, can help to make you feel energetic and get over a craving.
• Review your reason for quitting. Just having tobacco even once will only increase your craving and make it stronger. Get over the craving by reminding yourself why you want to be tobacco free.
• Go to a tobacco free zone. Most public places don’t allow smoking. Go to a movie, a park, or any other tobacco free public place where you’re forced not to use tobacco.
• Calculate your savings. Tobacco products are expensive. Add up all the money you’re saving and decide what you’re going to buy with it.
• Keep your mouth busy. Keep saunf, laung or elaichi in your mouth. Buy chewing gum instead of a tobacco product, or keep hard candy with you. Drinking water also works!
• Do something else. When a craving hits, stop what you’re doing immediately and do something else. Simply changing your routine can help you shake off a craving.
• Take deep breaths. Breathe through your craving by inhaling (through your nose) and exhaling (through your mouth). Repeat this 10 times or until you’re feeling more relaxed. Yoga or pranayam can help you get over the craving.
  

This is only for your information, kindly take the advice of your doctor for medicines, exercises and so on.   

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Humans May Recognize Disease with Their Eyes. Study Finds

What does a sick person look like? Could you recognize one if you saw them on the street? These queries feel more pertinent than ever in light of the coronavirus outbreak, but also in general. A fascinating recent study published in the biological research journal 'Proceedings of the Royal Society B' tried to provide the answers.

How Was the Research Conducted?
The researchers started out by taking face photos of 16 healthy people. Later on, those same people were injected with a shot of lipopolysaccharide, a harmless molecule found on many pathogenic bacteria, which releases a response from the immune system. Within only 2 hours, the participants’ faces developed visual symptoms of “sickness”. Another round of photos was taken. Both times, the subjects wore a plain white t-shirt and looked straight into the camera with a neutral expression.  

The pictures were shown to 2 groups of 60 people. The first group was asked to rate simply if each person in the photo looked sick or healthy. The second group was asked to rate how tired or alert each person looked on a scale of 1 to 7.

The researchers point out that the features that revealed people as sick to the observers were mainly:

    Paleness of the skin and lips
    Hanging eyelids
    Swollen face
    Droopier corners of the mouth
    Patchy skin.

How Accurate Is the Research?

It is important to note that the study has a few limitations. The observers were not allowed to look at the photos for longer than 5 seconds, and the study didn’t look at the visual symptoms ad sickness past a few hours’ time. Another setback is that the age, ethnicity, and backgrounds of the participants were not diverse enough for the findings to be generalizable, as most of those who took part were Caucasian young adults.

Out of 1,215 photos that were categorized by observers as ‘sick’, 440 were actually healthy.

So can superficial characteristics we instinctively connect with sickness really be trusted? John Axelsson, one of the lead researchers in the study says that despite those limitations, the overall conclusion is that untrained people are able to recognize sickness in other individuals above chance level. According to him, the information that was collected could be of use in the future – for example, in improving the technology used to monitor how sickness spreads across populations or in diagnosing patients.

There is still a lot to be learned and expanded on the topic – for example, is detecting sickness something that we know genetically or something that is learned? Undoubtedly, more research needs to be done before we can have a clear cut resolution on this interesting topic.

This is only for your information, kindly take the advice of your doctor for medicines, exercises and so on.     

https://gscrochetdesigns.blogspot.com. one can see my crochet creations  
https://gseasyrecipes.blogspot.com. feel free to view for easy, simple and healthy recipes    
https://kneereplacement-stickclub.blogspot.com. for info on knee replacement