<p>Text messages can give smokers the constant reminders they need to stay focused on quitting and double their chances of kicking the butt, a new study has found.<br /><br /></p>.<p>More than 11 per cent of smokers who used a text- messaging programme to help them quit did so and remained smoke free at the end of a six-month study as compared to just 5 per cent of controls, according to researchers at Milken Institute School of Public Health at the George Washington University (Milken Institute SPH).<br /><br />"Text messages seem to give smokers the constant reminders they need to stay focused on quitting," said Lorien C Abroms, an associate professor of prevention and community health at Milken Institute SPH and lead author of the study.<br /><br />"However, additional studies must be done to confirm this result and to look at how these programmes work when coupled with other established anti-smoking therapies," Abroms said.<br /><br />Smokers trying to quit can turn to the tried-and-true methods like phone counselling through a quit line and nicotine replacement therapies, but increasingly the evidence is building for using text messaging on mobile phones.<br /><br />Text-messaging programmes, like Text2Quit, work by sending advice, reminders and tips that help smokers resist the craving for a cigarette and stick to a quit date.<br /><br />Despite the widespread use of anti-smoking apps and texting programmes, there had been no long-term studies of such programmes in the US.<br /><br />Most of the existing research on such programmes were small in size, lacked a control group, and did not biochemically verify smoking status, Abroms said.<br /><br />To help address such gaps, Abroms and her colleagues decided to carry out a large, randomised trial of a text-messaging programme.<br /><br />They recruited 503 smokers on the internet and randomised them to receive either a text-messaging programme called Text2Quit or self-help material aimed at getting smokers to quit.<br /><br />At the end of six months, the researchers sent out a survey to find out how many people in each group had stopped smoking.<br /><br />They found that people using the text-messaging programme had a much higher likelihood of quitting compared to the control group, a finding that suggests that text-messaging programmes can provide an important boost for people struggling with a tobacco habit.<br /><br />To verify the positive results, the researchers collected a sample of saliva from smokers who reported quitting and tested it to see if it showed any evidence of a nicotine byproduct called cotinine.<br /><br />The quit rates for people with biochemically confirmed abstinence at the six month mark were still two times higher than the control group, Abroms said.</p>
<p>Text messages can give smokers the constant reminders they need to stay focused on quitting and double their chances of kicking the butt, a new study has found.<br /><br /></p>.<p>More than 11 per cent of smokers who used a text- messaging programme to help them quit did so and remained smoke free at the end of a six-month study as compared to just 5 per cent of controls, according to researchers at Milken Institute School of Public Health at the George Washington University (Milken Institute SPH).<br /><br />"Text messages seem to give smokers the constant reminders they need to stay focused on quitting," said Lorien C Abroms, an associate professor of prevention and community health at Milken Institute SPH and lead author of the study.<br /><br />"However, additional studies must be done to confirm this result and to look at how these programmes work when coupled with other established anti-smoking therapies," Abroms said.<br /><br />Smokers trying to quit can turn to the tried-and-true methods like phone counselling through a quit line and nicotine replacement therapies, but increasingly the evidence is building for using text messaging on mobile phones.<br /><br />Text-messaging programmes, like Text2Quit, work by sending advice, reminders and tips that help smokers resist the craving for a cigarette and stick to a quit date.<br /><br />Despite the widespread use of anti-smoking apps and texting programmes, there had been no long-term studies of such programmes in the US.<br /><br />Most of the existing research on such programmes were small in size, lacked a control group, and did not biochemically verify smoking status, Abroms said.<br /><br />To help address such gaps, Abroms and her colleagues decided to carry out a large, randomised trial of a text-messaging programme.<br /><br />They recruited 503 smokers on the internet and randomised them to receive either a text-messaging programme called Text2Quit or self-help material aimed at getting smokers to quit.<br /><br />At the end of six months, the researchers sent out a survey to find out how many people in each group had stopped smoking.<br /><br />They found that people using the text-messaging programme had a much higher likelihood of quitting compared to the control group, a finding that suggests that text-messaging programmes can provide an important boost for people struggling with a tobacco habit.<br /><br />To verify the positive results, the researchers collected a sample of saliva from smokers who reported quitting and tested it to see if it showed any evidence of a nicotine byproduct called cotinine.<br /><br />The quit rates for people with biochemically confirmed abstinence at the six month mark were still two times higher than the control group, Abroms said.</p>