E-cigarettes don't help smokers stay off cigarettes, study suggests
Cigarette smokers who quit smoking but substitute e-cigarettes, or other tobacco product, are more likely to relapse, study finds

Date:
October 19, 2021
Source:
University of California - San Diego
Summary:
E-cigarette use did not help smokers quit and may make smokers
more likely to relapse, according to a new study.



FULL STORY ==========================================================================
The United States Centers for Disease Control and Prevention have
suggested that smokers who are unable to quit smoking may benefit by
switching from smoking cigarettes to vaping e-cigarettes if they switch completely and are able to avoid relapsing to cigarette smoking.


========================================================================== However, there have been few studies on whether smokers are able to
transition to e-cigarettes -- battery-operated devices that heat a
liquid made of nicotine, flavorings and other chemicals to make an
aerosol that users inhale into their lungs -- without relapsing back to cigarette smoking.

Published in the Oct. 19, 2021 online issue of JAMA Network Open,
an analysis by the Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health and Human
Longevity Science at University of California San Diego and UC San Diego
Moores Cancer Center reports that e-cigarette use -- even on a daily
basis -- did not help smokers successfully stay off cigarettes.

"Our findings suggest that individuals who quit smoking and switched to
e- cigarettes or other tobacco products actually increased their risk
of a relapse back to smoking over the next year by 8.5 percentage points compared to those who quit using all tobacco products," said first author
John P. Pierce, Ph.D., Distinguished Professor at the Herbert Wertheim
School of Public Health and UC San Diego Moores Cancer Center.

"Quitting is the most important thing a smoker can do to improve their
health, but the evidence indicates that switching to e-cigarettes
made it less likely, not more likely, to stay off of cigarettes."
Researchers used data from the nationally representative Population
Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) longitudinal study, undertaken
by the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and the FDA Center for
Tobacco Products under contract with Westat. The team identified 13,604
smokers between in 2013 and 2015 who were followed over two sequential
annual surveys to explore changes in use of 12 tobacco products.



==========================================================================
At the first annual follow up, 9.4% of these established smokers had
quit. Now considered "former smokers," 62.9% of these individuals
remained tobacco free, while 37.1% had switched to another form of
tobacco use. Of these recent smokers who switched to another product,
22.8% used e-cigarettes, with 17.6% of switchers using e-cigarettes daily.

Recent former smokers who switched to e-cigarettes were more likely to be
non- Hispanic white, have higher incomes, have higher tobacco dependence
scores and view e-cigarettes as less harmful than traditional cigarettes.

"Our goal in this study was to assess whether recent former smokers who
had switched to e-cigarettes or another tobacco product were less likely
to relapse to cigarette smoking compared to those who remained tobacco
free," said senior author Karen Messer, Ph.D., professor and chief of the Division of Biostatistics at the Herbert Wertheim School of Public Health.

At the second annual follow up, the authors compared the former smokers
who were tobacco free to those who had switched to e-cigarettes or other tobacco products. Individuals who switched to any other form of tobacco
use, including e-cigarettes, were more likely to relapse compared to
former smokers who had quit all tobacco, by a total of 8.5 percentage
points.

Among recent former smokers who abstained from all tobacco products, 50%
were 12 or more months off cigarettes at the second follow up and were considered to have successfully quit smoking; this compared to 41.5%
of recent former smokers who switched to any other form of tobacco use, including e-cigarettes.

While individuals who switched were more likely to relapse to smoking,
they were also more likely to attempt to quit again and be off cigarettes
for at least three months at the second follow up. A further follow-up
survey is needed to identify whether this is evidence of a pattern of
chronic quitting and relapsing to cigarette smoking, or whether it is
part of progress toward successful quitting, said the researchers.

"This is the first study to take a deep look at whether switching to
a less harmful nicotine source can be maintained over time without
relapsing to cigarette smoking," said Pierce. "If switching to
e-cigarettes was a viable way to quit cigarette smoking, then those
who switched to e-cigarettes should have much lower relapse rates to
cigarette smoking. We found no evidence of this." Co-authors include:
Ruifeng Chen, Sheila Kealey, Eric C. Leas, Martha M. White, Matthew
D. Stone, Sara B. McMenamin, Dennis R. Trinidad, David R. Strong and
Tarik Benmarhnia, all of UC San Diego.

This research was funded, in part, by the National Institutes of Health (1R01CA234539) and the Tobacco-Related Disease Research Program of the University of California Office of the President (28IR-0066).

========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by
University_of_California_-_San_Diego. Original written by Yadira
Galindo. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


========================================================================== Journal Reference:
1. John P. Pierce, Ruifeng Chen, Sheila Kealey, Eric C. Leas, Martha M.

White, Matthew D. Stone, Sara B. McMenamin, Dennis R. Trinidad,
David R.

Strong, Tarik Benmarhnia, Karen Messer. Incidence of Cigarette
Smoking Relapse Among Individuals Who Switched to e-Cigarettes
or Other Tobacco Products. JAMA Network Open, Oct. 19, 2021; DOI:
10.1001/ jamanetworkopen.2021.28810 ==========================================================================

Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2021/10/211019120109.htm

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