Intense program helps smokers quit

An intensive stop-smoking program with at least three months of counseling and free drugs can help smokers kick the habit, researchers report.

Researchers at the Cardiac Center of Creighton University in Omaha divided 209 smokers into two groups. All should have been highly motivated -- they were patients in the coronary-care unit suffering from heart attacks, severe coronary heart disease or a type of chest pain known as unstable angina. All were told to quit smoking and received 30 minutes of counseling with self-help materials.

Half then were given at least 12 weeks of behavior modification counseling and either nicotine replacement therapy, treatment with the drug bupropion, or both. Bupropion is an antidepressant that has been shown to help people quit smoking.

After two years, 39% of the intensive-treatment patients were still not smoking, compared with 9% of the usual care group. The results were reported last week in the journal Chest.