To investigate the effect of cigarette smoking on human circulatory systems, five healthy male smokers were assigned to smoke a high nicotine cigarette for 5 minutes. Before, during and after smoking we recorded blood pressure, heart rate, respiratory rate and expiratory Pco2, and also measured the blood flow velocity of cerebral and peripheral arteries continuously using the Multi-Doppler-System. Change of blood flow velocity was checked statistically in each artery for 1 minute before and 1 minute after the beginning of smoking. Significant increases of blood flow velocities were observed in all 5 cerebral arteries (5 subjects) for 1 minute after the beginning of smoking. Of 5 peripheral arteries (5 subjects), 3 showed significant decrease and the other 2 showed no significant change. No remarkable change of blood pressure or heart rate was observed in all 5 subjects. The level of Pco2 decreased during smoking in all 4 subjects measured.
We concluded that the smoking of a high nicotine cigarette resulted in an increase of cerebral blood flow even with the decrease of Pco2. The effect of smoking seems unclear for the flow of the peripheral artery.
