Do e-cigarettes help smokers quit? Boston Globe

[Kent C]

http:// Do e-cigarettes help smokers quit? - Health & wellness - The Boston Globe

Enough bad stuff to break the link but some good comments too:

"But the research, published last Monday in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine, raises more questions than it answers because only 88 of the 949 smokers in the study reported using e-cigarettes.

That small sample size makes it difficult to draw firm conclusions, admits study leader Dr. Pamela Ling, an associate professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco. “We also looked at a broad population of smokers,” she said, “not just those who were specifically interested in quitting.”

In fact, only 8 percent of e-cigarette users reported that they were trying to quit when they were surveyed, and only 40 percent had any intention of quitting in the next six months.

“This means that we actually know for a fact that the majority of e-cigarette users in this study were not using these products as part of a quit attempt,” Dr. Michael Siegel, a tobacco control researcher at Boston University School of Public Health, wrote in a post on his blog. “Rather, it is a deliberate attempt on the part of the investigators to misuse data.”

Setting those fighting words aside, the study highlights the lack of evidence to determine whether e-cigarettes are a good smoking cessation aid — even though some smokers swear by them for helping them ease off their habit.""

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re: bold: the 'broad population of smokers' include those who have no interest in quitting smoking - in fact, are in fear that they won't be getting their nicotine. That really isn't the 'market' for ecigs. Only 8% in the study reported they were trying to quit. This IS the market, but the sampling is so small, any results would be, as the article suggests - meaningless.

And depending on what types of ecigs were used - some hardcore smokers may have the idea that 'this isn't going to get it' - my first response of vaping a cigalike supermini.


All of the 'good doctors' and notables have pointed all this out and more. Basically, the study was deeply flawed and biased and used not for science, but as a weapon for PR and for controlling behavior.

 

[VapieDan]

Ha! I was only interested in cutting down and satisfying my nicotine urges in places where cigarettes were not allowed. The e-cigs lured me into vaping and off cigarettes completely. It's a damned "gateway" to non smoking.

 

[Stosh]

Good propaganda does not need to be based in truth, facts. Repeated often enough, in view of large numbers of casual viewers, it is still effective.

 

[VapieDan]

If you tell a big enough lie long enough and loud enough it will be accepted as truth. Worked for Hitler and Stalin.

 

[Roger_Lafayette]

(This will go in my media summary today, but since I saw this thread, I deciced to paste it in. Sometimes things get lost when lots of articles get covered in the same post.)

To get some perspective on this story, it might be worth considering what actually happened here.

On 3/24 (last Mon) the original version of this story was published. After providing a minor caveat to the junk Gana et al. letter in JAMA, it brushed that aside, and went on to embrace the conclusion clearly proferred by the junk letter. To make matters worse, it ended by endorsing the poison call center hysteria.

Yesterday, the story was re-written. The writer substituted Dr. Siegel's critique of the junk study, and then - as before - ran roughshod over his objections, essentially endorsed the junk letter again, and ended with the same pathetic poison control crud.

The phrase in the 3/24 verion which was used to breezily ignore the small sample size ("Setting those limitations aside") was replaced in the new 3/30 version with the phrase "Setting these fighting words aside," - i.e. a reference to Siegel's criticism.

Nothing has really changed - if anything the author's new verison is even more offensive, because both basically say the same thing: the junk study is essentially valid, and the criticisms of it (this time by Dr. Siegel) are trivial.

To make matters even worse, someone at BU decided to link to the new version. One has to wonder with Dr. S. would be appalled. I know I was.

***

{Comments posted to page containing this story, &/or e-mail to Editor would be helpful.}
Title: Do e-cigarettes help smokers quit? [NEW VERSION PUBLISHED ON 3/30]
(Boston MS US local paper) http://www.bostonglobe
.com/lifestyle/health-wellness/2014/03/30/cigarettes-help-smokers-quit/yzMFrfhjw3ZqKbjHP2vMTL/story.html
Title: Study raises questions about if e-cigarettes help smokers quit [OLD VERSION PUBLISHED ON 3/24]
(Boston MA US local paper) http://www.bostonglobe
.com/lifestyle/health-wellness/2014/03/24/evidence-that-cigarettes-help-smokers-quit/bZLVskIa6Ng8L0Tae6UldJ/story.html
These two stories had me scratching my head for quite some time, until I broke them down, paragraph-by-paragraph. The 3/24 piece was described in this space on 3/25 as uncritically accepting the Gana et al. junk letter in JAMA, which was critcized by Dr. Siegel (and many others) for generalizing based on 88 smokers who had tried vaping at some point during a year, but who had no known intention to quit. The earlier article also mixed in the poison control calls meme (which it also uncritically accepted).
The first paragraphs of both stories are identical. But from there on out, the writer has apparently spliced in Dr. Siegel's critique - and then proceeded to blithely ignore it.
PREVIOUS (3/24) VERSION: "A new study is bound to add fuel to the fire. Researchers followed nearly 1,000 smokers for a year and found that those who used e-cigarettes were no more likely to quit smoking or reduce their dependence on tobacco cigarettes compared to those who weren’t using the products at the beginning of the study. But the research, published Monday in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine also raises more questions than answers since only 88 of the 949 smokers in the study reported using e-cigarettes.
[para break] "That small sample size makes it difficult to draw firm conclusions, admits study leader Dr. Pamela Ling, an associate professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco. 'We also looked at a broad population of smokers,' she said, 'not just those who were specifically interested in quitting.'
[para break] "Setting those limitations aside, the study highlights the lack of evidence to determine whether e-cigarettes are a good smoking cessation aid - even though some smokers swear by them for helping them ease off their habit."
NEW (3/30) VERSION: "A new study is bound to add fuel to the fire. Researchers followed nearly 1,000 smokers for a year and found that those who used e-cigarettes were no more likely to quit smoking or reduce their dependence on tobacco cigarettes than those who weren’t using the products at the beginning of the study. About 14 percent of those who didn’t use e-cigarettes quit smoking compared to 10 percent of those used the products.[new sentence inserted]
[para break] "But the research, published last Monday in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine, raises more questions than it answers because only 88 of the 949 smokers in the study reported using e-cigarettes.
[para break] "That small sample size makes it difficult to draw firm conclusions, admits study leader Dr. Pamela Ling, an associate professor of medicine at University of California, San Francisco. 'We also looked at a broad population of smokers,' she said, 'not just those who were specifically interested in quitting.'
[para break] "In fact, only 8 percent of e-cigarette users reported that they were trying to quit when they were surveyed, and only 40 percent had any intention of quitting in the next six months. [New para inserted]
[para break] "'This means that we actually know for a fact that the majority of e-cigarette users in this study were not using these products as part of a quit attempt,' Dr. Michael Siegel, a tobacco control researcher at Boston University School of Public Health, wrote in a post on his blog. 'Rather, it is a deliberate attempt on the part of the investigators to misuse data.'[New para inserted]
[para break] Setting those fighting words aside,
[In the previous version, this phrase was "Setting those limitations aside,"]
the study highlights the lack of evidence to determine whether e-cigarettes are a good smoking cessation aid - even though some smokers swear by them for helping them ease off their habit."
In other words, the writer simply substituted Dr. Siegel's objections for her own prior caveat, and then went on to conclude - as she did before - that the junk Gana et al. analysis was legitimate.
To make matters worse, the new version of the piece goes on to embrace the poison center call hysteria.
In a final insult, it seems that the folks at Boston U. didn't realize that the writer was simply running roughshod over Dr. Siegel's objections, and linked to the story on BU's own site, underneath a picture of Dr. S.:
http://www.bu
.edu/news/2014/03/31/do-e-cigarettes-help-smokers-quit-2/