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Nicotine e-cigarettes: considerations for healthcare providers

Nature Medicine (2024)Cite this article

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Tobacco use continues to be the leading cause of preventable disease and death in the United States. There are no safe tobacco products; however, the health risks for tobacco products exist on a continuum, with combustible products such as cigarettes being the most harmful. Decades of research have documented that cigarette smoking harms nearly every organ of the body; cigarette smoke contains nearly 7,000 chemicals, approximately 70 of which cause cancer1.

Non-combustible tobacco products, such as e-cigarettes, generally have lower health risks to the user than combusted tobacco products. The US National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine (NASEM) found conclusive evidence that switching completely from cigarettes to e-cigarettes reduces a person’s exposure to many toxicants and carcinogens that are present in combusted tobacco cigarettes1.

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References

  1. National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine. Public Health Consequences of E-cigarettes (National Academies Press, Washington DC, 2018).

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Public Health Sciences, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, SC, USA

    Benjamin A. Toll

  2. Cancer Control and Prevention, MUSC Hollings Cancer Center, Charleston, SC, USA

    Benjamin A. Toll & Tracy T. Smith

  3. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences, Medical University of South Carolina, Charleston, SC, USA

    Benjamin A. Toll & Tracy T. Smith

  4. Center for Tobacco Products, Food and Drug Administration, Silver Spring, MD, USA

    Brian A. King

Authors
  1. Benjamin A. Toll
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  2. Tracy T. Smith
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  3. Brian A. King
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Corresponding author

Correspondence to Benjamin A. Toll.

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Competing interests

B.A.K. and T.T.S. declare no competing interests. B.A.T. testifies on behalf of plaintiffs who have filed litigation against tobacco companies.

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Toll, B.A., Smith, T.T. & King, B.A. Nicotine e-cigarettes: considerations for healthcare providers. Nat Med (2024). https://doi.org/10.1038/s41591-024-02926-7

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