We've all known for a while now that smoking indoors around children and non-smoking family members isn't exactly beneficial to their health, to say the least. But according to new research published by the British Medical Journal's Tobacco Control Journal, living with smokers could be just as bad for your health as living in the heart of a heavily-polluted city.

The study, carried out by researchers at the universities of Edinburgh and Aberdeen, showed that those living in smoking households were exposed to as much as 10 times the number of damaging air particles as those in non-smoking homes. Using fine particulate matter (or PM2.5) as an indicator of second hand smoke damage, researchers found that smokers' homes contained levels of these pollutants that were up to 3 times higher than the World Health Organisation's guidance for annual exposure. The data, collected from the homes of 93 smokers, is sure to strike a chord with the thousands around the country struggling to quit the habit for the sake of those they love.

With Stoptober just behind us when tens of thousands of you took up the challenge to start to quit, it will be painfully clear how difficult and drawn-out the process of giving up something that’s so ingrained in your life can be. Love of family and a desire to protect them from the ravages of second-hand smoke may be a motivator, but studies have shown that most need more than mere motivation to get them through their quitting period.

Many try patches or over-the-counter remedies to stave off the cravings, but there is another way. Millions of electronic cigarette users across the country wax lyrical about the support these devices have offered them in their battle against tobacco addiction. And, as 'e-cigs' contain just 4 ingredients rather than the 4000 toxins released when smoking cigarettes, many of which were implicated in the study, it’s also far safer.

For smokers whose main concern is cutting out the negative effects of smoking on those around them, electronic cigarettes are a potentially life-changing resource. By providing smokers with an alternative that both helps to manage nicotine addiction and imitates the familiar sensation of smoking, e-cigarettes have a massive role to play in eliminating the damaging effects of second hand smoke.

So if you're a smoker worried about the implications of this new study, and about the effects that smoking has on both your health and your wallet, why not see if you could benefit from vaping?