No More Tobacco

Teatime Media has recently released an App for the iPhone that will help smokers kick their habit. The App, “My QuitLine” is one of the most simple Apps available for the iPhone. When you first open the App, you get a single sentence stating; “My QuitLine helps you quit smoking by putting you in touch with FREE expert advice from counselors at the National Cancer Institute Quitline.” Below this sentence is 2 buttons. The first button calls the National Quitline. The second button takes you to your browser to start a live chat session.

With the recent success of the Apple iPhone, this enables millions of users to have this resource avalaible at their fingertips. This could potentially help a very large number of smokers who would like help, but are unsure how to get it. This is an excellent use of technology and for such uses, the publisher of the App is to be commended on a job well done. “My QuitLine” was developed by the The George Washington University’s School of Public Health and Health Services (SPHHS) and the National Tobacco Cessation Collaborative (NTCC), with support from the National Cancer Institute (NCI).

Dr. Lorien Abroms, assistant research professor in the Department of Prevention and Community Health at The George Washington University, studies how new media technologies can be applied for smoking cessation. She designed the app with feedback from the NTCC, after reading an NTCC report about the lack of iPhone apps that link smokers to proven therapies. “Quitline counseling has been shown to double a person’s chance of quitting smoking. It is important to make sure that in these new media environments, people still receive information about what has been proven to work in quitting smoking, and get access to tools that are based on these proven therapies,” said Dr. Abroms.

If you do not have access to the Apple iPhone, you may still access the National Cancer Institute Quitline at 1 (877) 448-7848.

The professionals at the National Cancer Institute Quitline are available Monday - Friday, 9:00am - 4:30p.m.

Tobacco Control in the USA: Raising Legal Smoking Age to 21…according to Medical News Today, the Louisiana Legislature has proposed a bill to raise the age of legal tobacco use from 18 to 21 years old.

If House Bill 240 passes in the 2008 Regular Session, it will be illegal for anyone under the age of 21 to buy or possess any tobacco products.

Walker Hines, D-New Orleans, said he proposed House Bill 240 to reduce health care costs for the state and prolong the lives of Louisiana residents. Louisiana would be the first state to change the age to 21 if the bill passes.

This is a huge step for tobacco control, possibly saving millions of lives if passed. Hopefully, the bill will pass and the remaining states will follow with the same bill.  view source

Best Days To Quit Smoking… We often go about random tasks, that are not routine, like quitting smoking, very arbitrarily. Maybe there is a better alternative. While leafing through a Farmers Almanac, noticed was the fact that they have a list of the best days of the month to do these random tasks, astrologically. Included was the best days of the month to quit smoking.

Best days to quit smoking in May: 3, 4, 22, 23, 26, 27, 30, 31

If you know someone on the fence about quitting, let them know about these days, maybe it will help them kick the habit. It could very well save lives.

Computerized Program Helps Teens Quit Smoking… Medical News Today reported that according to a new study by Deborah J. Fritz, PhD, smoking cessation programs are helping youths stop smoking. According to the CDC, 22% of high school students and 10% of middle school children smoke in America. The habit is considered an epidemic. Fritz and her co-authors report in the January-February 2008 issue of Pediatric Nursing, that the Computerized Adolescent Smoking Cessation Program (CASCP) is effective in getting teenagers to quit, inexpensive, and easily implemented in schools.

With use of this program they found that 1 month after the intervention, 20% of the experimental group quit smoking. This is a great step in the fight against tobacco. As well, this shows how well cessation programs can work. “The encouraging results show the CASCP program does work and that such programs should be implemented in schools whenever possible.”, says Fritz. Nurses play a key role in recruiting adolescents into smoking cessation programs and/or referring them to agencies such as the American Lung Association for help. view source

National No Smoking Day 2008…National No Smoking Day 2008. Today March 12th. A day that will hopefully lead millions of smokers to put them down for good. If not for good, at least for one day. If you are a smoker today is the day to lay the cigarettes down. Even quitting for a day, the dangers of secondhand smoke are eliminated from the lungs of your loved ones, also giving your lungs a chance to start to repair themselves. If you are thinking about quitting, know this, your lungs start repairing themselves the instant you quit smoking. Do yourself, your friends and family, and the whole world a favor, quit smoking and help someone else quit too. Have a wonderful National No Smoking Day 2008 from NoMoreTobacco.com !!

Best Days To Quit Smoking… We often go about random tasks, that are not routine, like quitting smoking, very arbitrarily. Maybe there is a better alternative. While leafing through a Farmers Almanac, noticed was the fact that they have a list of the best days of the month to do these random tasks, astrologically. Included was the best days of the month to quit smoking. 

BEST DAYS TO QUIT SMOKING IN March : 1, 2, 5, 6, 21, 22, 28, 29

If you know someone on the fence about quitting, let them know about these days, maybe it will help them kick the habit. It could very well save lives.

Smoking Is Major Risk Factor For Stroke In China, accounting for about one in seven strokes in men, researchers reported in Stroke: Journal of the American Heart Association.

“This study shows that smoking prevention and cessation could be an important approach to reducing the societal burden of stroke,” said Jiang He, M.D., Ph.D., senior author of the study. 

Many studies in western populations have shown that cigarette smoking is a strong and independent risk factor for stroke. But the relationship between cigarette smoking and stroke hasn’t been well-studied in Asian populations - including China, where stroke is the second leading cause of death.

“The study findings were consistent with reports from other populations, but in China this risk creates a huge public health problem,” said He, the Joseph S. Copes Chair and professor of epidemiology at Tulane University School of Public Health and Tropical Medicine in New Orleans, La. “In addition to being the world’s most populous nation, China is the world’s leading producer and consumer of cigarettes.” reported originally by Medical News Today. view source

It’s Never Too Late To Quit… Medical News Today reported an interesting article. Many people spend a lifetime trying to give up smoking, but there is good news for older smokers from research carried out at the Peninsula Medical School in South West England. A study by Dr. Iain Lang and his colleagues has revealed that the point of retirement is one of the most effective times to try to give up smoking. view source

March 9th, 2008 No Smoking Day in the U.K…. March 9th marks this year’s day for going smoke-free in the U.K.  It is only one day, but if everyone quit smoking for just the one day, some of them might see, they can quit…forever! Simple idea really, pick a random day out of the year and and call it no smoking day, thereby potentially savings thousands or millions of lives (after you factor in the secondhand smoke effects). So tell all of your U.K. buddy’s to put the smokes away for the day. Don’t worry Americans your day is Wednesday, March 12, 2008.

Happy No Smoking Day

Stem Cells Prevented From Becoming Cartilage By Toxins In Cigarette Smoke… reported originally by Medical News Today. A toxic pollutant spread by oil spills, forest fires and car exhaust is also present in cigarette smoke, and may represent a second way in which smoking delays bone healing, according to research presented at the annual meeting of the Orthopaedic Research Society in San Francisco.

In 2005, researchers from the University of Rochester Medical Center identified one ingredient in smoke, nicotine, that delays bone growth by influencing gene expression in the two-step bone healing process: stem cells become cartilage; cartilage matures into bone. In the current study, some of the same researchers found that a second smoke ingredient, the polyaromatic hydrocarbon benzo(a)pyrene (BaP), also slows bone healing, but in a different way.

Smoking has been shown to delay skeletal healing by as much as 60 percent following fractures. Slower healing means a greater chance of re-injury and can lead to chronic pain and disability. The obvious solution is for smokers to quit when they get hurt, but studies show that just 15 percent can.

“Our results provide the first evidence that BaP prevents stem cells from becoming cartilage cells as part of healing,” said Regis J. O’Keefe, M.D., PhD., chair of the Department of Orthopaedics and Rehabilitation at the Medical Center and a study investigator. “These findings extend our understanding of the impact of cigarette smoke on a process that is critical to fracture repair. Perhaps down the road we will be able to speed bone healing among smokers in more than one way.”  view source