TY - JOUR T1 - Smoking Cessation and Changes in Body Mass Index Among Middle Aged and Older Adults. JF - J Appl Gerontol Y1 - 2018 A1 - Sharma, Andy KW - Aged KW - Aged, 80 and over KW - Body Mass Index KW - Female KW - Humans KW - Male KW - Middle Aged KW - Models, Statistical KW - Smoking cessation KW - Weight Gain AB -

OBJECTIVE: This study contributes to the body of literature examining smoking cessation and body mass index (BMI) for adults aged 50 and older.

METHOD: Utilizing the 2004 and 2010 waves of the RAND Health and Retirement Study, this analysis utilized Fixed Effects (FE) regression on a sample of 1,316 adults aged 50 and older.

RESULTS: Older adults undergo a small change in BMI after a transition from smoking to nonsmoking during a 6-year period, and this occurs after accounting for individual-level unobserved heterogeneity. More specifically, men experience a BMI gain of 1.24 ( p< .01) and women experience a BMI gain of 1.58 ( p< .01).

DISCUSSION: Gerontologists/health professionals can use these results to inform older adults about the potential for a small increase in BMI and, in the process, assuage any apprehensions about excessive weight gain. This insight may encourage a greater number of older adults to cease smoking.

VL - 37 UR - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27353834 IS - 8 U1 - http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/27353834?dopt=Abstract ER -