Smoking effects caused by carbon dioxide accumulation within the blood together with those caused by airways resistance amounts to greater effects to the manner in which the heart operates. Since very little oxygen is allowed through airways, the heart is left with a great task of ensuring that oxygen inefficiency is compensated for. More so, nicotine present in the smoke coming from cigarettes stimulates heart’s operations and increases the rate at which the heart beats. This results to increased blood pressure which in turn decreases blood flow through blood vessels.
When blood flows within blood vessels, it is loaded with oxygen which is then transported to various body parts during blood circulation. When blood is pumped at a faster rate than the appropriate one, amounts of oxygen made available within the bloodstream reduces as well. This provides considerably small oxygen amounts available during exercise while the practice demands a higher amount. Other contradicting studies have found out that the heart rate is decreased rather than increased by smoking. This happens when the lungs are affected resulting into cardiovascular diseases.
At the early stages of smoking, an individual’s heart rate is accelerated by nicotine amounts but when the practice continues for a greater length of time smokers experience cardiovascular diseases. A better explanation of this is that smokers experience higher heart rates in the resting form when compared to non smokers. However, the same category of people experience decreased heart rates at a maximum when compared to non smokers. The increased heart rates at rest implies that the hearts of smokers are forced to work extra harder in order to ensure that the body is fed with sufficient amount of blood.
It becomes impossible for the heart to perform this task efficiently as it encounters limited heart rates at the maximum. Hence, the required amount of oxygen as well as nutrients that the body demands in order for the muscles to work as expected during stressing instances like those encountered when exercising is reduced. This means that there are particular effects that take place immediately someone indulges in smoking while there are others than occur as a result of continued indulgence in smoking. (Andersen, 2007)