Health
Sudden bid to quit smoking help more than planned attempts
By IANS
Jan 27, 2006, 19:38

If you want to quit smoking, making a sudden bid could help more than planned attempts, say scientists.

It has traditionally been thought that the best way to beat the habit is for smokers to go through several stages - thinking about stopping, planning an attempt and making that attempt.

But the researchers at University College London interviewed more than 1,900 smokers and ex-smokers about their attempts to quit and found that two-hirds of smokers who stopped suddenly succeeded for at least six months, compared to under half of those who planned it in detail, reported the online edition of BBC News.

The study, which appeared in the British Medical Journal, said the planners possibly felt less strongly about giving up.

In the study, 65 percent of the unplanned quit attempts had succeeded for at least six months. This compared with 45 percent of those who planned to give up in advance.

The researchers however said their findings do not imply that planning to quit is counter-productive.

"The results do not mean that we should tell everyone to stop without planning ahead, but they do tell us something about the state of mind of the smoker who wants to quit," said lead researcher Robert West.

"Dissatisfaction with being a smoker creates a kind of tension. Then, when that tension is high, even quite a small trigger makes the smoker decide that the time has come to stop.

"If that decision is to quit sometime in the future, rather than right away, in some smokers it could indicate a weaker commitment."

According to WHO, smoking is a greater cause of death and disability than any single disease and considered responsible for approximately five million deaths worldwide every year.

By 2020, WHO expects the worldwide death toll to reach 10 million, with 17.7 percent of the deaths in developed countries.

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