E-cigs increase stroke risk, too

The evidence of substantial health risks for e-cigarettes just continues to grow.  Tarang Parekh and colleagues’ paper “Risk of Stroke With E-Cigarette and Combustible Cigarette Use in Young Adults” in American Journal of Preventive Medicine reports elevated risk of stroke in dual cigarette smokers and e-cigarette users beyond the risks of smoking.  Significantly, they also show no benefit of “complete switching.”

They do find that people who just use e-cigarettes (and never smoked cigarettes) have a lower risk of stroke than people who just smoke, but most adult e-cigarette users are dual users or switchers.

Here is the abstract:

Introduction.  Rising trends in stroke incidence and hospitalizations because of combustible cigarette smoking have been noted among younger adults. However, the association between e-cigarette use and stroke in this population remains largely unknown. This study examines the association between e-cigarette use with or without a history of previous or concurrent combustible cigarette use and stroke among young adults.

Methods. Pooled data (2016–2017) were analyzed from the Behavior Risk Factor Surveillance System, a nationally representative, cross-sectional telephone survey, in 2019. The sample size was 161,529 participants aged 18–44 years. The association between e-cigarette use and stroke was examined using logistic regression adjusting for patient demographics, relevant comorbidities without or with history, and concurrent use of combustible cigarette use.

Results.  Current dual use of e-cigarettes and combustible cigarettes was associated with 2.91 times higher odds of stroke versus nonsmokers (AOR=2.91, 95% CI=1.62, 5.25) and 1.83 times higher odds versus current sole combustible cigarette users (AOR=1.83, 95% CI=1.06, 3.17). Compared with nonsmokers, current sole e-cigarette users did not show significantly different odds of stroke (AOR=0.69, 95% CI=0.34, 1.42). However, odds of stroke were lower for sole e-cigarette users versus current sole combustible cigarette users (AOR=0.43, 95% CI=0.20, 0.93).

Conclusions.  Sole e-cigarette use is not associated with greater odds of stroke in young adults. However, if young adults have former or current combustible cigarette use, odds of stroke are significantly increased even compared with current sole combustible cigarette use. Switching from combustible cigarettes to e-cigarettes does not confer stroke benefits.

The full citation is Parekh T, et al.  Risk of Stroke With E-Cigarette and Combustible Cigarette Use in Young Adults.  American Journal of Preventive Medicine 2020, epub head of print.  https://doi.org/10.1016/j.amepre.2019.10.008.  It is available here.