Reported patterns of vaping to support long-term abstinence from smoking: a cross-sectional survey of a convenience samp
- PDF / 1,226,237 Bytes
- 9 Pages / 595.276 x 790.866 pts Page_size
- 97 Downloads / 128 Views
Open Access
RESEARCH
Reported patterns of vaping to support long‑term abstinence from smoking: a cross‑sectional survey of a convenience sample of vapers Sarah Victoria Gentry1* , Emma Ward1, Lynne Dawkins2, Richard Holland3 and Caitlin Notley1
Abstract Background: E-cigarettes are the most popular aid to smoking cessation attempts in England and the USA. This research examined associations between e-cigarette device characteristics and patterns of use, tobacco-smoking relapse, and smoking abstinence. Methods: A convenience sample of 371 participants with experience of vaping, and tobacco-smoking abstinence and/or relapse completed an online cross-sectional survey about e-cigarettes. Factors associated with smoking relapse were examined using multiple linear and logistic regression models. Results: Most participants were self-reported long-term abstinent smokers (86.3%) intending to continue vaping. Most initiated e-cigarette use with a vape pen (45.8%) or cig-a-like (38.7%) before moving onto a tank device (89%). Due to missing data, managed through pairwise deletion, only around 70 participants were included in some of the main analyses. Those using a tank or vape pen appeared less likely to relapse than those using a cig-a-like (tank vs. ciga-like OR = 0.06, 95% CI 0.01–0.64, p = 0.019). There was an inverse association between starting self-reported e-cigarette liquid nicotine concentration and relapse, interacting with device type (OR = 0.79, 95% CI 0.63–0.99, p = 0.047), suggesting that risk of relapse may have been greater if starting with a low e-cigarette liquid nicotine concentration and/or cig-a-like device. Participants reported moving from tobacco-flavored cig-a-likes to fruit/sweet/food flavors with tank devices. Conclusions: Knowledge of how people have successfully maintained tobacco-smoking abstinence using vaping could help other tobacco smokers wishing to quit tobacco smoking through vaping. Keywords: e-Cigarettes, Smoking relapse, Cross-sectional survey Background E-cigarette use, known as “vaping,” is thought to be less harmful than tobacco smoking [1] and e-cigarettes are the most popular aid to smoking cessation attempts in England [2] and the USA [3]. Estimated current *Correspondence: [email protected] 1 Norwich Medical School, University of East Anglia, Norwich Research Park, Norwich NR4 7TJ, UK Full list of author information is available at the end of the article
e-cigarette use prevalence among tobacco smokers in the UK is 21.9%, and 36.5% report ‘ever use’ [4]. In the USA, 15.9% report current use and 47.6% ever use [5]. Regular (at least weekly) e-cigarette use among never smokers in Great Britain has been very rare (
Data Loading...
