Effectiveness of smoking cessation intervention in patients with cardiovascular disease

Introduction and objectives. The incidence of coronary events descends in p atients with cardiac disease who quit smoking. Only around 50% of the patie nts who quit smoking after an acute event remain abstinent three months aft er hospital discharge. The objective of this study was to evaluate the effe ctiveness of a tobacco dishabituation program in patients with cardiovascul ar disease. Methods. We studied a cohort of smokers who started a smoking cessation pro gram between September 1993 and June 1999. We compared 348 patients with ca rdiovascular disease with 1.107 smokers without disease. A twelve-month pro tocolized follow-up was performed, measuring carbon monoxide for evaluating relapse on every control. We calculated the abstinence in each period and estimated the odds ratio for relapse at twelve months. Results. We observed a global continued abstinence at twelve months of 37.1 % (129/348) in the patients with cardiovascular disease and of 39.6% (438/1 .107) in the patients without disease. The consonant smokers (pre-contempla tives) showed a greater number of relapses, with an adjusted Odds ratio of 1.36. Conclusions. Exhaustive treatment and follow-up achieved a percentage of gr eat abstinence in the cardiovascular patients of our study who were unable to quit smoking during hospitalisation or after diagnosis. We therefore sug gest that these patients may benefit from inclusion in smoking cessation un its.