Time to selected quit date and subsequent rates of sustained smoking abstinence

Abstract

In efforts to combat tobacco dependence, most smoking cessation programs offer individuals who smoke the choice of a target quit date. However, it is uncertain whether the time to the selected quit date is associated with participants' chances of achieving sustained abstinence. In a pre-specified secondary analysis of a randomized clinical trial of four financial-incentive programs or usual care to encourage smoking cessation (Halpern et al. in N Engl J Med 372(22):2108-2117, doi: 10.1056/NEJMoa1414293 , 2015), study participants were instructed to select a quit date between 0 and 90 days from enrollment. Among those who selected a quit date and provided complete baseline data (n = 1848), we used multivariable logistic regression to evaluate the association of the time to the selected quit date with 6- and 12-month biochemically-confirmed abstinence rates. In the fully adjusted model, the probability of being abstinent at 6 months if the participant selected a quit date in weeks 1, 5, 10, and 13 were 39.6, 22.6, 10.9, and 4.3%, respectively.

Household-smoking bans are associated with reduced nicotine exposure, increased smoking abstinence, and improved birth outcomes among pregnant women enrolled in smoking-cessation treatment.

“…Precommitment strategies, such as voluntarily restricting access to temptations or instituting barriers to prevent negative behaviors, have been shown to bridge the intention–behavior gap and promote behavior change (Armitage, 2004; Milne, Orbell, & Sheeran, 2002; Sheeran & Orbell, 2000). In relation to smoking, a large body of data indicates that individuals who precommit to a quit date are more likely to go through with and maintain a quit attempt (Anesi, Halpern, Harhay, Volpp, & Saulsgiver, 2017; Balmford, Borland, & Burney, 2010). Consistent with this theory, our data show that smokers who adopted a smoking ban during their quit attempt were also more likely to be abstinent at late-pregnancy and postpartum assessments.…”