Motivating smokers with mental illness to quit

"Our research found that a brief motivational interviewing intervention is a reasonable approach for increasing quit attempts, even in smokers with serious mental illness who were not initially interested in quitting," said Marc L. Steinberg, PhD, associate professor of psychiatry at Rutgers Robert Wood Johnson Medical School and lead author of the study. "The findings suggest that motivational interviewing may be a more productive approach than traditional educational interventions.

"Many healthcare providers assume that individuals with serious mental illness will only respond to very intensive interventions, and therefore, do nothing due to time constraints." Dr. Steinberg continued. "On the contrary, our data indicates that smokers with serious mental illness will respond to even a very brief intervention."

While motivational interviewing provided a benefit with regard to quit attempts, Dr. Steinberg and his colleagues found that many of the quit attempts did not translate into lasting abstinence.

"Individuals with serious mental illness are less likely to quit as compared to those without mental illness, and while we were able to use a brief intervention to encourage quit attempts, it is likely to require more intensive treatments, including counseling and pharmacotherapy, to produce longer-term abstinence," said Dr. Steinberg.

Nicotine & Tobacco Research has named Dr. Steinberg's study as the Editor's Choice in the March issue.

"The results of the Steinberg study suggests the usefulness of motivational interviewing with adults with SMI [serious mental illness] as well. Future studies can build on these results to determine the best ways to motivate the greatest number of adults with SMI to make a quit attempt," according to the journal's editorial.