Reasons to Stop Smoking
Benefits of stopping smoking
Effectiveness of Hypnosis
Other methods

Reasons to Stop Smoking

There are many reasons why people want to stop smoking. They include:

• Better health
• Reduced risk of cancer, heart disease and bronchial problems
• Having more energy
• Breathing easier
• Smelling better
• To save money
• It’s unsociable to smoke

You probably already know this. But did you know:

• Smoking kills more than 114,000 people in the UK every year.
• Most smokers die from one of the three main diseases associated with cigarette smoking: lung cancer, chronic obstructive lung disease (bronchitis and emphysema) and coronary heart disease.
• Tobacco smoke contains many chemical compounds including carbon monoxide, arsenic, formaldehyde, cyanide, benzene, toluene and acrolein.
• One in two long-term smokers will die prematurely as a result of smoking – a quarter of these in middle age.
• Deaths caused by smoking are five times higher than the 22,833 deaths arising from: road traffic accidents (3,439), other accidents (8,579), poisoning and overdose (881), alcoholic liver disease (5,121), murder and manslaughter (513), suicide (4,066), and HIV infection (234) in the UK during 2002.
• A smoker’s life span is shortened by about five minutes for each cigarette smoked. On average, those killed by smoking have lost 10-15 years of life

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The Benefits of Stopping Smoking

• After just 20 minutes your blood pressure and pulse return to normal
• After eight hours levels of nicotine and carbon monoxide in your system will be halved
• After one day your carbon monoxide level will be at non-smokers' levels
• After 2 days there is no nicotine left in the body
• After three days your breathing becomes easier as the bronchial tubes begin to relax
• In the long term, stopping smoking reduces the risk of lung and other cancers, heart attack, stroke and chronic lung disease. After 5 to 15 years the level of risk returns to that of a non-smoker

Above facts according to www.ash.org.uk.

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Hypnosis is the most effective way of giving up smoking!

Hypnosis is the most effective way of giving up smoking, according to the largest ever scientific comparison of ways of breaking the habit. Willpower, it turns out, counts for very little.

Smokers are coming under increasing pressure to quit. Earlier this month the Institute of Actuaries published the results of a study it commissioned which showed that the mortality rate for smokers is twice as high as for nonsmokers, and that, on average, a smoker dies 6 years earlier than a nonsmoker. Surveys suggest that three in four smokers would like to give up, according to the antismoking campaign Action on Smoking and Health (ASH).

To find the most effective way to give up smoking, Frank Schmidt and research student Chockalingam Viswesvaran of the University of Iowa carried out a meta-analysis, statistically combining the results of more than 600 studies covering almost 72 000 people from America, Scandinavia and elsewhere in Europe.

By combining the results from so many separate studies, the meta-analysis enables the real effectiveness of each technique to be picked out from the statistical 'noise' that often blights studies involving smaller numbers of subjects.

The results, published in the current issue of the Journal of Applied Psychology, show that the average success rate for all methods was 19 per cent: that is, only about one in five smokers is likely to succeed using methods covered by the study.

Patients told that they had serious cardiac disorders, and so a clear incentive to stop immediately, had the highest quitting rate, at 36 per cent. But for most smokers the most effective technique was hypnosis, in which smokers go into a state of deep relaxation and listen to suggestive tapes. The analysis of treatment by hypnosis, which included 48 studies covering over 6000 smokers, gave an average success rate of 30 per cent for this method.

'Combination' techniques, combining, for example, exercise and breathing therapy, came second with a success rate of 29 per cent. Smoke aversion, in which smokers have their own warm, stale cigarette smoke blown back into their faces, achieved a 25 per cent success rate, followed by acupuncture at 24 per cent.

The least successful method turned out to be advice from GPs, which appears to convince virtually no one to give up. Sheer willpower proved little better, with a success rate of only 6 per cent. Self-help, in the form of books or mail-order advice, achieved modest success - around 9 per cent, while nicotine gum was a little better at 10 per cent.

'We found that involvement of physicians did not have as big an impact as we expected,' said Schmidt 'We speculate that the reason is that it is the content of the treatment that matters, and not the status of the person giving it.'

David Pollock, director of ASH, said he was surprised by the success of hypnosis, which anecdotal evidence had suggested was not very effective. One organisation not surprised by the results is the British Society of Medical & Dental Hypnosis. Christopher Pattinson, the society's academic chairman, said that current hypnosis techniques are a far cry from their popular image of music-hall tricks involving swinging fob watches. The latest relaxation techniques achieve success rates of up to 60 per cent from a single session, he said.

Richard Doll, the epidemiologist who carried out the pioneering studies of the risk of smoking, said that the apparent success of hypnosis and the high quitting rate of patients with heart disease backed his own observations.

He added, however, that he was somewhat surprised by the low success rate of those who resorted to willpower alone: 'The majority of people find it not too difficult to give up,' he said. 'The only way to succeed is to want to do it enough. You have got to really appreciate what the risk is. I smoked and gave up without too much difficulty.'

From issue 1845 of New Scientist magazine, 31 October 1992, page 6

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Other methods of stopping smoking

Nicotine Patches and Gum

The premise behind the nicotine replacement therapy is that:
a) nicotine is addictive and so
b) smokers will get withdrawal symptoms when they stop smoking by themselves.

Nicotine patches claim they help smokers overcome any withdrawal effects from stopping smoking by releasing nicotine into the body i.e. replacing one form of nicotine with another. However, even with patches or gum you will still need to use willpower because nicotine replacement therapy will not completely remove the desire to smoke.

Those promoting nicotine replacement therapy claim a success rate of twice that of willpower. Considering willpower has a success arte of about 5 – 7 % that means nicotine replacement therapy has a success of 10% - 14%.

Reported side effects: skin rash (patches), insomnia, nausea, mouth ulcers (gum) and indigestion (gum).

Nicobrevin

Nicobrevin is marketed as a nicotine-free supplement to alleviate the withdrawal symptoms from giving up smoking. It claims to calm your nerves, and block the craving for cigarettes.

Zyban

Zyban (bupropion hydrochloride) is an anti-depression drug used to help smokers quit smoking.

Reported side effects include insomnia, headaches, seizures and death!

Champix (Varencline)

Champix (Varencline) is a course of tablets. The claim is that they reduce the need to smoke caused when the blood level of nicotine falls in a smoker who has quit, and also makes cigarettes less satisfying.

Reported side effects: Some users have reported feeling depressed or suicidal!

Allen Carr Method

The book “Easy Way to Stop Smoking” by Allen Carr has probably helped many thousands of people stop smoking. Allen Carr used to be a heavy smoker. However after seeing a hypnotherapist he stopped smoking. Allen Carr felt that it wasn’t so much the work of the hypnotherapist but the understanding that he gained about the damage he was doing to his body by smoking. He went on to write his best selling book and set up a clinic in London where he helped groups of smokers quit smoking. However the procedure he used meant that the smokers could continue smoking while he counselled them. Allen Carr died in November 2006 from lung cancer.

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