Understanding your smoking

When considering quitting smoking it is important to try and be clear to yourself about the extent of your smoking - a light smoker may need different support to a heavy smoker.

Know your enemy
It can be extremely difficult to stop smoking as the nicotine in cigarettes has similar effects to heroin and cocaine on the brain dopamine systems. Most smokers take several attempts to quit (the average is around five or six attempts) before they finally succeed. Only three per cent of smokers who attempt to stop without getting some sort of help are still smoke-free after one year.

Don’t do it alone
The chances of successfully giving up smoking are greatly improved with medical treatments and support. Advice and support from a trained healthcare professional, such as a pharmacist, nurse, doctor or trained smoking counsellor, have all been shown to help smokers quit permanently. You already know quitting isn’t easy, so it will help to have the support of those around you.

Don’t give up trying. Remember you may not manage to give up first time but there are healthcare professionals as well as treatment and support options available to help you quit for good.

There has never been a better time to quit.