New strategies and drugs for smoking cessation
Hot topicsChairs: C. Gratziou (Athens, Greece), L. Allegra (Milano, Italy)
Aims: Tobacco smoking is the most important cause of lung diseases, and smoking cessation is the first and most important therapy to be used in many of the most prevalent among them.
Tobacco smoking is a disease in itself; to heal from it is difficult. Failure and relapses are very frequent and, in most smokers, smoking is a chronic condition. There are drugs which can be successfully used for helping smokers to quit: with these drugs the healing is easier even if the long-term success rates remain under 50%.
In chest medicine, smoking cessation should always be achieved (in smoking lung patients) and drugs effective in smoking cessation widely prescribed.
Smoking cessation and smoking reduction should be included in the routinary clinical practice of every chest physician.