Skip to main page content
U.S. flag

An official website of the United States government

Dot gov

The .gov means it’s official.
Federal government websites often end in .gov or .mil. Before sharing sensitive information, make sure you’re on a federal government site.

Https

The site is secure.
The https:// ensures that you are connecting to the official website and that any information you provide is encrypted and transmitted securely.

Access keys NCBI Homepage MyNCBI Homepage Main Content Main Navigation
. 2016 Sep;33(5):525-531.
doi: 10.5152/balkanmedj.2016.151610. Epub 2016 Sep 1.

Does Short Message Service Increase Adherence to Smoking Cessation Clinic Appointments and Quitting Smoking?

Seda Tural Önür  1 , Mehmet Atilla Uysal  1 , Sinem İliaz  2 , Sibel Yurt  1 , Ayşe Bahadır  1 , Didem Görgün Hattatoğlu  1 , Mediha Gönenç Ortaköylü  1 , Belma Akbaba Bağcı  1 , Efsun Gonca Uğur Chousein  1
Affiliations

Does Short Message Service Increase Adherence to Smoking Cessation Clinic Appointments and Quitting Smoking?

Seda Tural Önür et al. Balkan Med J. 2016 Sep.

Abstract

Background: Using innovative and scientific methods increases the rate of quitting in smokers. Short message service (SMS) is a communication tool widely used and well integrated in many people's daily lives. To increase adherence to appointments in smoking cessation clinics (SCC), it is thought that increased compliance could be achieved by falling outside the traditional methods. SMS has been shown to increase the compliance of patients with SCC appointments.

Aims: In this study, we aimed to evaluate the effect of SMS in the compliance of patients with SCC follow-up visits and smoking cessation success.

Study design: Case-control study.

Methods: Our study was a controlled, open, prospective study. We enrolled 436 cases applied to SCC of Yedikule Training and Research Hospital between 01.10.2013-30.06.2014 and agreed to follow-up with SMS. SMS was sent to the patients to remind them of appointments at the SCC and to query their smoking state.

Results: Two hundred-and-eighty seven (65.8%) of the patients were male and 149 (34.2%) were female. The mean age was 45±12 years. In this study, 296 (67.9%) patients had graduated from primary school. Our patients' smoking state was queried by telephone at the 6-month follow-up and we contacted 348 patients. According to this, 88 (25.3%) patients were not smoking, and 260 (74.7%) patients were smokers. Therefore, the smoking cessation rate was 24% (n=60) in patients who did not respond to SMS reminders at all, and 28.6% (n=28) in patients answering any SMS at least once (p=0.377). Smoking cessation rate of the patients invited by SMS but who did not attend any control visits was 19.1%, and it was 34.5% in patients coming to a control visit at least once. This difference was statistically significant (p=0.001).

Conclusion: In our study, there was increased success of smoking cessation in patients coming to control visits. We think that this may result from the possibly increased compliance to SCC appointments following reminders by SMS, and that this may also increase smoking cessation success.

Keywords: Cigarette smoking; counseling; short message service; smoking cessation.

PubMed Disclaimer

Conflict of interest statement

No conflict of interest was declared by the authors.

Figures

FIG. 1.
FIG. 1.
Flowchart of smokers in the study
See this image and copyright information in PMC

References

    1. 2010. Ministry of Health Turkey Global Adult Tobacco Survey: Turkey report.
    1. Ghouri N, Atcha M, Sheikh A. Influence of Islam on smoking among Muslims. BMJ. 2006;332:291–4. http://dx.doi.org/10.1136/bmj.332.7536.291. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
    1. Yuksel H, Corbett KK. Mixed messages: a qualitative study of the meanings and context of high school students’ tobacco use in Turkey. Health Promot Int. 2005;20:360–6. http://dx.doi.org/10.1093/heapro/dai019. - DOI - PubMed
    1. WHO Framework Convention on Tobacco Control. Status of payments of voluntary assessed contributions (VAC) as of 31 March 2015.
    1. World Health Organization Turkey marks progress in fight against noncommunicable diseases. 2012.