If you’re a smoker, you may have heard the term “smoking cessation.” Perhaps your doctor has suggested you follow a smoking cessation program to improve your health. So, what exactly does smoking cessation mean, and why should you consider it?
Smoking cessation simply means quitting smoking. But quitting smoking, no matter what term you use, isn’t so simple. It often takes people many tries and many different methods before they quit smoking for good.
Why should you quit smoking?
You may already know that smoking causes lung cancer and lung disease, such as COPD. Yet those are not the only harms of smoking. If you don’t quit, smoking can also increase your risk for developing several other types of cancer, including colon, bladder, and liver cancer. It also increases your risk of diabetes and heart disease — and makes you more likely to experience infertility and pregnancy complications.
Health benefits of quitting smoking
When you quit smoking, you reduce your risk for the health dangers above. As soon as you stop smoking, your body starts to repair itself.
According to the American Lung Association, here are some of the health benefits you can expect to see after quitting smoking:
- 12 to 24 hours after quitting: Your risk for a heart attack drops significantly.
- Two weeks to three months after quitting: Your risk for a heart attack continues to drop. Your lung function starts improving.
- One year after quitting: Your added risk of heart disease is half that of a smoker’s.
- Five to 15 years after quitting: Your risk for a stroke is the same as someone who never smoked. Your risk of mouth, throat or esophageal cancer is half that of a smoker’s.
- 10 years after quitting: Your risk of getting bladder cancer or dying from lung cancer is about half that of a smoker’s. Your risk for getting cervical cancer or cancer of the larynx, kidney or pancreas also drops.
- 15 years after quitting: You risk of heart disease is the same as someone who never smoked.
Get help quitting
Quitting smoking isn’t something many people can do on their own. Smoking cessation programs and products can help.
Smoking cessation programs
Behavioral support, through cognitive behavioral therapy or other counseling, can help people quit smoking.
You can get free coaching through quitlines — hotlines to help you quit smoking — either over the phone or through text. Try these through the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention:
- Call 1-800-QUIT-NOW (1-800-784-8669).
- Text QUITNOW to 333888 (message and data rates may apply).
- Download the CDC’s quitSTART app.
Smoking cessation products
Quit-smoking medicines may also help break the habit or may boost the effects of smoking cessation programs. The Food and Drug Administration has approved several quit-smoking medicines. Each works in different ways to reduce nicotine cravings and ease withdrawal symptoms.
They include five nicotine-replacement medicines that come in different forms. The first three you can buy over the counter:
- Nicotine patch. You wear these on your skin for 24 hours to keep a steady nicotine level.
- Nicotine gum. After a few chews, keep the gum between your cheek and gums to help your mouth absorb the nicotine.
- Nicotine lozenges. These look like hard candies. Keep them between your cheek and gums.
The CDC recommends combining the nicotine patch with nicotine gum or lozenges, which work much quicker, to better manage cravings. You need a prescription for the other two nicotine replacement medicines:
- Nicotine oral inhaler. You can take short puffs to ease cravings.
- Nicotine nasal spray. This is often prescribed for people with severe nicotine addiction.
