Keenan Brown Ideas/Influences Fall 2013

Health Complications Associated with African American Smoking

Smoking as defined by The World Book Dictionary is known as drawing the smoke from a pipe, cigar, or cigarette into the mouth and puffing it out again. Four thousand chemical compounds are contained in cigarette smoke. These chemicals that are found in cigarette smoke are toxic and can cause a various amount of different cancers. Smoking has been linked to numerous amounts of death amongst African Americans. This is an issue that requires an interdisciplinary approach. It is a complex societal issue that one single discipline that is offered at most universities cannot provide the knowledge base for understanding and trying to find ways to improve or curtail trends. According to the Center of Disease Control smoking not only causes diseases to become present in the body, but smoking also affects almost every organ in the body. This habit can not only cause cardiovascular and respiratory disease, but also a massive amount of different types of cancer and also death. Having these problems for a long period of time or having one of the many types of cancers that are caused by smoking can lead to death Health and education are the two disciplines that could particularly be used to address the barriers to quitting smoking and improving health among African Americans. As an interdisciplinarian I have to understand smoking behaviors and their physiological effects on health. Research is the most important method of obtaining information on this issue and

educating smokers is the most important task. Smokers may be more likely to stop smoking if they understand the risk involved and why they demonstrate addictive smoking behaviors. Addiction itself is closely related to growth and maturity. It is definitely a communal issue that has its challenges that need to be addressed and conquered. The seeds of imagination and struggle are key to this topic. Effort is necessary to being able to push through addiction and make our ideas of physical and mental health come into fruition ( Arroyo,2013). We must understand the importance of knowledge and creating good habits to become better interdisciplinarians from scholastics to applying the same strategy to personal health. This idea of personal spiritual development is a postmodernistic idea. The health and education disciplines have to be integrated in order to adequately attend to this health disparity. Health professionals have a duty to care and actively do what they can to prescribe the best course of action for smokers. The interdisciplinarian thought process can be implemented to research ways to prevent deteriorating behaviors. In our culture smoking is legal and people enjoy cigarettes. However, when it reaches a point where cancers and high death rates are frequent and broad, other methods of intervention should be implemented.

References Andrew T. Arroyo, Ideas And Their Influences Second Edition (2003)
Peters, Ronald J., Jr., Steven H. Kelder, and Regina J. Johnson. "Cigarette Smoking Topography Among Alternative School Youth: Why African American Youth Smoke Less But Are at Higher Long-Term Risk." Journal of Psychoactive Drugs 44.3 (2012): 252-58. Print. Aldrich, Melinda, and Rajesh Kumar. "Genetic Ancestry-Smoking Interactions and Lung Function in African Americans: A Cohort Study." PLOS One 7.6 (2012): 1-8. Print.

Fernaner, Anita, and Mitzi Schumacker. "An Examination of Socioculturally Specific Stress and Coping Factors on Smoking Status Among African American Women." Stress and Health 24 (2008): 365-74. Web