Young Kiwis smoke less after txt

A University of Auckland study has shown that text messages can help young smokers quit cigarettes.

Quit rates at six weeks of young smokers receiving active text support on Stomp, or the Stop Smoking with Mobile Phones Trial, were double those in a control group, the international journal Tobacco Control reported.

The trial was developed and run by the Clinical Trials Research Unit (CTRU) at the University of Auckland, to target young smokers who have the highest smoking rates but are least likely to enrol in existing programmes.

Dr Anthony Rodgers, director of the CTRU, said the approach had real promise in helping young adults kick the habit, and harnessing the global boom in texting could be a new weapon to combat a similarly large escalation in youth smoking.

"This is a very encouraging result. We want to develop the concept further but this trial confirms that a text-based approach has the potential to be a powerful resource in reaching and helping young smokers," Dr Rodgers said.

The development was supported by Auckland UniServices Limited, the commercialisation company of the University, and it was conducted with the help of the National Heart Foundation, the Cancer Society, Vodafone and Alcatel.

Vodafone New Zealand's health sector manager, Dr Malcolm Miller, said it was great to see a truly creative approach developed in New Zealand show such strong results.

"We view Stomp as just one of the first applications off the rank to use advances in mobile technology to help individuals become experts in managing their wellness."

He said Vodafone was also looking at other applications such as e.fitness, e.nutrition, and diabetes and cardiovascular intervention programs.
The Ministry of Health has said it will support the project and has committed to working with the CTRU and providers of mobile phone services on ways to make the development more widely available to young people.

There were 1705 young smokers from around New Zealand (who all wanted to quit) enrolled in Stomp. Half of them were in an "active" group and received intensive text intervention leading up to an agreed quit date and one month of free texting.

This included regular personalised text messages that encouraged them to give up smoking or provided distraction at the key moment when tempted to light up.

"There are several ways we think it worked," said Dr Rodgers. "Free texting acted like "chewing gum for the fingers" and helped with distraction as people texted friends and family. We sent personalised texts on things like coping with urges to smoke, avoiding weight gain, and just plain general interest stuff on sports, music and fashion.

"Using text crave, participants could "pull" a message of support. Text polls and quizzes added further distraction. A lot of people picked up on text buddies too, with people who were due to quit around the same day helping each other out."

Typical messages of support were: "Who else r u giving up smoking 4? Write down 4 people who will get a kick outta u kicking butt. Your mum, dad, m8s?"

Dr Rodgers said the treatment effect was consistent in participants of different ages, sex, income level or geographic location - it could be particularly effective in helping young Maori who have been not been able to be reached via traditional smoking cessation programmes.

Co-authors of the report, Dr Dale Bramley and Dr Tania Riddell from the School of Population Health at the University, helped develop message content that was of particular relevance to Maori.

"Being able to tailor the programme to suit the needs of individuals was the key to its success amongst Maori participants," said Dr Bramley. "We produced a number of messages on topics such as Te Reo, Maori legends and Maori traditions."

Quit rates remained high at six months, but Dr Rodgers said further study was needed to more closely quantify progress, extend the range of follow up testing and establish how success compared with other interventions over the longer term.

Future studies would also look at the use of newer multimedia phones which offer further opportunity for providing quit information and distraction.