Smoking
October 9, 2025 2025-10-26 1:52Smoking
Smoking
Enjoy the knowledge check, watch our video and learn about the Very Brief Advice. Keep scrolling down to see the research and useful signposts to help your patients stop smoking.
"The moment you stop smoking, your body begins to heal itself."
Allen Carr
Author
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How much do you know about smoking and prehabilitation?
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Watch our video
Stopping smoking is one of the best things a smoker can do to improve their health.
Stopping smoking
Helping your patients break the habit.
There is no safe level of smoking. It negatively affects all aspects of a person's health and wellbeing.
Healing problems
Smoking impairs wound healing, increases risks of infection and increases doses of anaesthetics required.
Health complications
Smokers are also more likely to experience heart or lung complications, need admission to intensive care and stay in hospital longer.
Long-term effects
Smoking leads to chronic conditions, such as COPD and cancer, and increases the risk of developing dementia.
Stopping to save money
The cost of smoking can be a good motivator to stop. Someone smoking 10 cigarettes a day will save over £2,000 a year!
Patients start to recover from the moment they stop...
Helping your patients to stop smoking is one of the best things you can do for their health. Watch the video to see what happens to a person’s body when they stop.
Empowering your patients
Very Brief Advice
Very Brief Advice on Smoking (VBA+) is a 30-second intervention that can be used in almost every consultation with patients.
Hover through the flipcards below
Act on patient's response.
People are more likely to stop if they receive specialist support.
Support
People are more likely to stop smoking successfully with specialist support and stop smoking aids, such as NRT, varenicline and cytosine.
Vaping
Vaping is one of the most effective tools for quitting smoking. It is not risk-free, but it is significantly less harmful than smoking.
What does the research and evidence say?
Click the links to see the evidence.
Links
Signposting
It is never too early or too late to stop smoking. The following resources can help you to empower smoking cessation.
Click the tabs below
Support people to quit by embedding Very Brief Advice on Smoking and referring for onward support.
Click the link on the right to see the resources.
Various resources have been developed to help professionals support their patients.
Click the links on the right to see the resources.
There are also websites that can help people to stop smoking including signposting to local stop smoking support.
Click the links on the right to see the resources.
