E-cigarettes can help smokers quit, but there's a catch
The findings, published in Nicotine & Tobacco Research , examined a national survey of more than 24,500 current or recent former cigarette smokers, which is the largest sample of smokers studied to date. This study, along with a July study published in the BMJ , provide some of the strongest evidence so far on the link between use of e-cigarettes and cessation, says the study's lead author David Levy, PhD, professor of oncology at Georgetown Lombardi. However, Levy notes, there are important nuances in the data that impact a person's success in quitting cigarette smoking. "Both cigarette quit attempts and quit success were directly related to the number of days of e-cigarette use," Levy explains. "The odds of quit success increased by 10 percent with each additional day of e-cigarette use." The data also show that among those making at least one quit attempt, quit success was lower among individuals who had used e-cigarettes at some point in th...