Smoker's fractures require more time to heal

Stem cells responsible for bone healing in blood samples extracted for the region of the fracture in 50 non-smokers and smokers with broken bones in the leg were analysed.

The cells in the blood of the nonsmokers were of superior quality and showed faster cell division that the cells in the blood of the smokers.

"After growing and harvesting the stem cells from the tissue, we were able to closely analyze and monitor how cigarette smoking had a detrimental impact on stem cell growth and development, giving rise to abnormal bone repair," Andrew Sloan, a researcher at the University of Lincoln, said in a university news release.

"We also showed how the molecules that [affect] certain cellular processes were being hampered by the toxic effects of the tobacco smoke and its constituent components," Sloan said.

The findings have not been published in any journal as yet but were presented at numerous medical confrences in Europe.

The next step of the research will involve finding out if the effects of smoking on bone repair are reversable, it was reported. The study however did not prove a cause-and-effect relationship.