Assessment of serum nitric oxide level in cigarette smoking

Background: Cigarette smoke has been implicated as a major risk factor in various diseases associated with endothelial dysfunction like essential hypertension, atherosclerosis and related cardiovascular dysfunction. Nitric oxide, an important second messanger plays a pivotal role in maintaining vasomotor tone and its level is also found to be altered in many chronic vascular disorders. The particulates in cigarette smoke is presumed to affect the production NO in vascular endothelium. Hence, it is proposed to study the effect of cigarette smoking in influencing Nitric oxide level. The study sample comprised of 138 chronic smokers and144 apparently healthy nonsmokers . Plasma glucose, total cholesterol (TC), high density lipoprotein cholesterol (HDL-c) and triglyceride concentration (TGL) were determined enzymatically and serum NO index (NOx) estimated by Griess method. It was found that serum NOx level was not influenced by biochemical parameters like plasma glucose and lipid profile. The estimated mean NOx levels was slightly lower in smokers(15.92 with SD 5.4) than in nonsmokers (16.66with SD 6.73) . However the difference was not statistically significant ( P= 0.31). It is concluded that there is no significant correlation between serum nitric oxide level and smoking, based on this study.