ArticleBMJ open2018
Lifetime cigarette smoking and chronic widespread and regional pain in later adulthood: evidence from the 1946 British birth cohort study.
Article in BMJ open, 2018. The graph could read no effect estimate from its abstract, so it casts no vote on the map. Cited by 7 papers.
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Who cites it
7 citing papers in PubMed, 16 citations in OpenAlex.
- Independent association of tobacco use with opioid use disorder in patients of European ancestry with chronic non-cancer pain.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2020Trial
- The impact of smoking and obesity on secukinumab effectiveness in psoriatic arthritis: real-world evidence from 1202 European patients.EULAR rheumatology open · 2026Article
- The bidirectional relationship between pain and tobacco use: Insights from the longitudinal Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) study.Drug and alcohol dependence · 2025Article
- The role of lifestyle factors in the association between education and self-reported fibromyalgia: a mediation analysis.BMC women's health · 2024Article
- Low Back Pain in Elderly from Belém-Pa, Brazil: Prevalence and Association with Functional Disability.Healthcare (Basel, Switzerland) · 2021Article
- Persistent inflammatory and non-inflammatory mechanisms in refractory rheumatoid arthritis.Nature reviews. Rheumatology · 2021Review
- Associations between smoking status and bodily pain in a cross-sectional survey of UK respondents.Addictive behaviors · 2020Article
Corrections and comments
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Authors and funding
3 authors at 2 institutions in 1 country.
Funding
Abstract
objectiveTo examine whether different lifetime patterns of cigarette smoking are associated with chronic widespread pain (CWP) and chronic regional pain (CRP) at age 68.
designProspective cohort study.
settingEngland, Scotland and Wales.
participantsUp to 2347 men and women from the Medical Research Council National Survey of Health and Development, who have been followed up since birth in 1946 and provided sufficient information on cigarette smoking across adulthood to be classified as never smoker, predominantly non-smoker, predominantly smoker or lifelong smoker and pain assessment at age 68. PRIMARY OUTCOME MEASURES: Pain was self-reported at age 68, and CWP was defined according to American College of Rheumatology criteria. Participants who reported having pain for ≥3 months but who did not meet the CWP definition were classified as having CRP; those who reported pain which had lasted for <3 months were classified as 'other' pain. No pain was the reference group.
resultsFindings from multinomial logistic regression models indicated that compared with never smokers, predominantly non-smokers, predominantly smokers and lifelong smokers all had an increased risk of CWP; relative risk ratios=1.70(95% CI 1.16 to 2.49); 2.10(95% CI 1.34 to 3.28) and 1.88(95% CI 0.99 to 3.57), respectively, after adjusting for sex, own occupational class, educational level, body mass index, leisure time physical activity, alcohol intake, long-standing illness and symptoms of anxiety and depression. No association was observed between smoking history and CRP or other pain.
conclusionsThese results suggest that exposure to cigarette smoking at any stage in adulthood was associated with higher risk of CWP in later adulthood; highlighting the ongoing importance of smoking prevention programmes. It also suggests that assessment of lifetime smoking behaviour may be more useful in identifying those at greater risk of CWP in later life than assessment of current smoking status.
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