Smoking Damage (06.21.04) - New research reveals how smoking causes some damage to your DNA that you can't undo. Nicotine and Teens (01.09.04) - Are you having trouble keeping your New Year's resolution to quit smoking? It may be because you started as a teenager. Smoking From All Sides Quit Smoking News Smoking Stinks! For some smokers, slapping on a patch or chewing some gum may not be enough to help them kick the habit. As this ScienCentral News video reports, psychologists have shown that for some, giving up for good may require long-term counseling as well as medication. Kicking the habit Although there's an array of effective treatments available over-the-counter or from the doctor that help many people successfully give up smoking, as many as 440,000 Americans still die each year from smoking-related illnesses . Part of the problem is that for some smokers who want to quit those treatments just don't seem to work. "It's really important to look at methods that are helpful to people who are chronic smokers, who are long-term smokers; who are seriously addicted; who, despite all the social pressure there are on people to quit, haven't been able to quit," explains addiction psychologist Sharon Hall , from the University of California, San Francisco . Hall and research team followed 160 volunteers who all smoked more than ten cigarettes a day. They all wore nicotine patches for eight weeks, along with counseling and medication for either 12 weeks or 12 months . The psychological counseling was combined with use of the anti-depressant nortriptyline, which has been shown to be effective in helping smokers quit, dealing with depressive symptoms commonly associated with nicotine withdrawal. Fifty percent of the 12-month group stayed smoke free, but only 18 percent of the 12-week group were smoke-free after a year. Hall says the rates of success for the long-term treatment are among the highest that have been reported, and are well above average rates between 20 and 35 percent for the most intensive and widely accepted treatments. Hall also compared both the short and extended combined treatments to short and extended psychological treatment without medication. Her results represent a new model in helping smokers quit, where treatment is not just a one-time event or a few brief sessions, but an ongoing process over an extended period of time, as you would expect when dealing with any chronic disease. The success of this study has led Hall to continue her work looking at long-term methods to help smokers quit, including working with older, chronic smokers who have been smoking for many years. She would also like to repeat this study in hope of replicating the success rates with a larger group of volunteers. Hall's research was published in the November issue of the American Journal of Psychiatry , and funded by the National Institute on Drug Abuse .

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