Smokers with high levels of a carcinogen byproduct ( NNAL ) are at higher risk of developing lung cancer . Smoking is a lot like Russian roulette : You never know who will end up developing lung cancer and who wo n't . But Dr. Jian-Min Yuan , as well as other researchers from the University of Minnesota , say they are one step closer to determining a smoker 's risk for developing the disease . In a study , they tracked the carcinogen and nicotine levels in nearly 500 smokers through a simple urine test and discovered a link between the level of a specific carcinogen and lung cancer . Their findings were presented at the American Association for Cancer Research conference . Why did researchers track only the levels of one carcinogen ? We all know that tobacco smoke is bad : It 's loaded with 60 different carcinogens , which cause all sorts of health risks . There is one carcinogen in particular that researchers suspected for years contributed to human lung cancer . But there were never any scientific human studies showing this relationship . This carcinogen is known as NNK . It releases into your body when you inhale smoke , quickly passes through the liver , gets metabolized and releases NNAL , a byproduct of NNK , into the bloodstream . University of Minnesota researchers were tracking the NNAL levels via urine samples . Watch Dr. Gupta explain the findings » . How much did a person have to smoke to develop high levels of NNAL ? The exact amount is a little tricky to determine because a lot depends on how honest a person is about how many cigarettes he or she smoked per day . Additionally , the type of cigarette and how deeply a person inhales could affect the amount of carcinogens in the body . Researchers say a person with high levels of NNAL and high levels of nicotine ( equivalent to smoking about a pack of cigarettes a day ) is 8.5 times more likely to develop lung cancer compared with a smoker with lower levels . While the researchers point out that not everyone who has a high level of NNAL is going to develop lung cancer , it does help assign a number to a risk that was hard to quantify before . Is n't smoking bad for you regardless ? What is the benefit of having this type of information ? There is nothing healthy about smoking . Even if this test pegs you at low risk of developing lung cancer , it does n't mean you wo n't develop a dozen other cancers commonly cause by smoking . If you smoke , the No . 1 thing you should do is quit . But that is easier said than done . If it were easy , 23 percent of adults in the United States would not smoke regularly . One benefit of knowing whether a smoker is at increased risk for lung cancer is for his or her doctor to screen the person regularly for abnormalities , in the hopes of catching the cancer early . Lung cancer is but one consequence of smoking , so this type of testing is not going to fix everything . But as far as lung cancer goes , it may give people a better idea of when and how often to get screened . Reported by CNN 's Danielle Dellorto .
First study to quantify link between carcinogen byproduct and lung cancer rates . Researchers tracked levels of byproduct ( NNAL ) using urine samples . People with high levels of NNAL doubled their risk of developing lung cancer . Test could identify high - risk people , aid in early detection and treatment . Bottom line : This test could one day be used to identify smokers at high risk for lung cancer , but ' n't help against smoking 's other health hazards .