A recent study published in the ‘Clinical and Translational Allergy Journal’ indicated that women who smoke even small amounts regularly are at an increased risk of atopic asthma. The smoking induced risk of non-atopic asthma continues for long, even after quitting, particularly in men.

This was a population-based incident case-control study, which involved 521 participants with an aim to assess the differences of smoking effects on risk of atopic and non-atopic asthma, and to determine if these effects vary with gender.

The key results were as follows:

• Regular smoking increased the risk of atopic asthma in women but not men.
• Recent quitting of smoking was related to increased risk of both atopic and non-atopic asthma.
• Quitting smoking over a year ago was related to increased risk of non-atopic asthma, specifically in men.

In conclusion, the findings of the study imply that gender does modify smoking effects on risk of atopic and non-atopic asthma and women may develop atopic asthma even with smoking relatively small quantities regularly.