E-Cigarette Use and Long-Term Cigarette Smoking Cessation Among U.S. Adult Cigarette Smokers

The effectiveness of e-cigarette use for long-term smoking cessation needs investigation, especially compared to existing pharmacotherapies such as nicotine replacement therapies (NRT) or prescription medications. This study examined the prospective associations between types of smoking cessation aids used and long-term smoking cessation among 6,617 U.S. adult smokers.

Within three waves of the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health Study, inverse probability weighted regression adjustment was used to model the treatment effects of smoking cessation aids (i.e., no aid use, e-cigarettes, NRT, prescription medications, and both NRT and prescription medications) on 12-month abstinence from cigarette smoking adjusting for a comprehensive set of multi-level confounders. Treatment effect was defined as the probability of 12-month abstinence in each group and average treatment effect (ATE) was the difference in probability between the treatment groups.

NRT (ATE= 0.045, 95% CI= 0.01, 0.08) and prescription medications (ATE= 0.153, 95% CI= 0.09, 0.22) were more effective than e-cigarettes for long-term cigarette smoking cessation. No aid use or concurrent use of both NRT and prescription medications were not significantly different from e-cigarettes for long-term cigarette smoking cessation.

E-cigarette use may play a role in harm reduction but not in long-term smoking cessation.