Vapeboss – A long-term study conducted by researchers at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center found that adult heavy smokers are more likely to quit when they switch to regular vaping.

Published recently in JAMA Network Open, the study, titled, “Association of e-Cigarette Use With Discontinuation of Cigarette Smoking Among Adult Smokers Who Were Initially Never Planning to Quit,” used data from 2014 to 2019 as part of the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) Study, a long-term study examining tobacco use behavior and related health patterns in the US.

Findings from Wave 1 of the study, released in 2016, have debunked certain misconceptions about vaping, such as the well-known Gateway Theory. When researchers focused their analysis on a selected group of 1,600 smokers who had no plans to quit smoking and were not using e-cigarettes when the study began, they found that those who vaped daily were the ones who successfully quit.

“These findings are paradigm-shifting, as the data suggests that vaping can actually help people who are not actively trying to quit smoking. Most other studies focus exclusively on people who are actively trying to quit, but this study suggests that we may be missing the effect of e-cigarettes by not considering this group of smokers with limited intentions to quit — a group that is often at high risk for poor health outcomes from smoking,” said Andrew Hyland, PhD, Chair of Health Behavior at Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.

The study reported that only about 6% of all smokers included in the trial quit smoking completely, but the rate was significantly higher among those who vaped daily, at 28%.

“While clinical trials show strong evidence that vaping can help people quit smoking, findings from real-world population studies have been mixed,” said the study's lead author, Karin Kasza, PhD, a research scientist in the Department of Health Behavior at Roswell Park.

“Our study identifies a positive association between daily vaping and smoking cessation specifically among a segment of smokers who were not planning to quit, consistent with data from clinical trials,” she added.