Smoking Cessation Pharmacotherapy, Even Without Counseling, Remains a Cornerstone of Treatment

In this issue of the Journal, Leas and colleagues report results from a prospective observational study of smokers making a quit attempt that concludes, "…the simple provision of pharmaceutical aids to smokers does not appear to be an effective way to increase the proportion who successfully quit for the long term" (1). Despite the rigorous methodological aspects of this study, we believe this conclusion is overstated for three main reasons: the conflicting body of evidence from large effectiveness randomized controlled trials (RCTs), which do not suffer from confounding; residual confounding, particularly by smoker type; and recall bias tending to under capture failed quit attempts that did not involve pharmacotherapy. While this study could bring useful attention to the benefits of counseling, it would be harmful if it discouraged cessation medication use when counseling was unavailable.

http://ift.tt/2kUu80q