Does physical exercise in addition to a multicomponent smoking cessation program increase abstinence rate and...

Does physical exercise in addition to a multicomponent smoking cessation program increase abstinence rate and suppress weight gain? An intervention study Tobacco use is considered the single most preventable cause of premature morbidity and mortality. Smoking cessation programs aim at two interrelated purposes, to help people to give up smoking and to prevent relapse. A multicomponent intervention consisting of nicotine replacement therapy, health education, behaviour modification therapy and counselling is widely recommended in the health care literature. Smoking cessation studies from a nursing perspective are few. The purpose of this quasi-experimental study was to compare outcomes of two nurse-managed 1-year group smoking cessation interventions. Intervention 1 (n=34) was provided at a health care centre and consisted of nicotine replacement therapy, health education, behavioural modification and individual and group counselling. In intervention 2 (n=33), provided in a health club, physical exercise was added to the intervention provided in 1. Participants were self-referred with equal numbers in both interventions. A nonsignificant difference in lapse free abstinence time (LFAT) at 1 year was demonstrated between intervention 1 (20.6%, n=7) and intervention 2 (39.4%, n=13) (p=0.16, odds ratio=2.5). The difference in weight gain between intervention groups was also nonsignificant. Within intervention comparison between abstinent participants and smokers showed that abstinent participants had gained significantly more weight than smokers in intervention 2 (p=0.001), but in intervention 1 the difference was nonsignificant (p=0.2). The small sample size in the study detracts from the significance of the findings. However, a trend is observed showing that physical exercise increases the abstinence rate of participants. The conclusion is drawn that a multicomponent smoking cessation program that includes physical exercise might be an effective intervention, but further studies with a larger sample size are needed.