Contingency management promotes smoking reductions in residential substance abuse patients

Abstract

Rates and consequences of cigarette smoking are more severe in substance abusers. In this 12-week pilot study, residential substance abuse treatment patients received standard care for smoking cessation (n=12) or prize contingency management (n=12) for expired carbon monoxide (CO) tests < or =8 ppm and salivary cotinine <10 ng/ml, which are indicative of smoking abstinence. Percentage of negative CO tests and the highest number of consecutive negative CO tests were greater in contingency management compared to standard care.

Figure 1

Individual data are presented for the 24 residential substance abuse treatment patients who were assigned to receive standard care (n  =  12) or standard care plus contingency management (n  =  12) for smoking abstinence for 12 weeks. Expired COlevels are depicted by open squares, and the number of self-reported cigarettes smoked per day is depicted by filled squares. On the x axis is study day (intake [I] and Day 1 through Day 84); on the y axis is a count from 0 through 50. A horizontal dashed line crosses the y axis at 8 to indicate the abstinence criterion (CO ≤ 8 ppm) as a reference point.