Quitline helps 23,000 smokers to stub out

By MARTIN JOHNSTON

More than 23,000 New Zealand smokers are said to have kicked the habit after ringing the Government's Quitline and using subsidised nicotine-replacement therapy.

But the Quitline thinks this number could be pushed higher.

It is hiring more advisers to help people quit through telephone counselling.

The Quitline told the Public Health Association conference in Christchurch this week that a survey indicated more than 23,000 people - 13 per cent of clients - had given up after telephone counselling and using the nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) gum or patches.

The Health Ministry survey of 2000 callers found that 18 per cent of those who had the "full service" remained smoke-free a year later.

The full service involves at least two conversations with a Quitline adviser, at least four weeks of NRT and the smoker having read some of the supplied quitting information.

But fewer than half of callers received that level of service. For the rest the one-year quit rate dropped to 10 per cent.

The Quitline began its national "motivational interviewing" service on toll-free phone lines in 1999.

In November 2000 the Government started offering eight weeks of subsidised NRT.

For the period until last April, some 173,000 people had received quitting support from the agency.

The Quit Group's executive director, Helen Glasgow, said studies had indicated that counselling plus nicotine replacement therapy could produce quit rates of 15 to 25 per cent.

"We're not quite as high as we would like to be because the service has been very stretched.

"The idea would be for them to be using eight weeks of NRT and to have several conversations with the quit advisers."

In a bid to satisfy demand for the service, it is increasing its number of fulltime-equivalent advisers from 24 to 35 by the end of the year.

Ms Glasgow said this would coincide with the introduction of the ban on smoking in restaurants and bars under the beefed-up anti-smoking laws passed last December.

Dying for a smoke

* A quarter of those aged 15 or over smoke.

* Smoking is the leading preventable cause of death in NZ, killing about 4700 people prematurely each year.

* Secondhand smoke kills a further 350.