Allen Carr‘s Easyway to Stop Smoking is a highly effective treatment to help smokers quit, according to a new study just published in the prestigious BMJ’s Tobacco Control journal. The study was carried out in Dublin by the Tobacco Free Research Institute Ireland and is the first published Randomised Clinical Trial (RCT) in the world about Allen Carr’s Easyway to Stop Smoking. RCTs are the most rigorous way of determining whether a cause-effect relation exists between treatment and outcome, and are considered the gold standard method of assessing effectiveness.
The Allen Carr method has been widely used for over 30 years and is available in 150 centres in over 50 different countries. It consists of a one-off 5-hour seminar which does not involve the use of any form of medication. Many celebrity testimonials endorse its effectiveness and there are claims that it has helped more than 30 million smokers quit. Despite this there has never been a published report from a scientific trial supporting its use in a general population.
This trial involved 300 adult smokers equally randomised to Allen Carr and the online HSE Quit.ie service and followed up for 1 year. Result showed a quit rate of 38% at 1 month, 26% at 3 months, 23% at 6 months, and 22% at 1 Year in the Allen Carr Group. This was almost twice the quit rate achieved in the Quit.ie group. These success rates are similar to those from the best available treatment programmes currently used for smoking cessation.
Close to 6000 of our citizens die annually from tobacco related disease, and smoking cessation is a very important element of Ireland’s plan to become Tobacco Free by 2025. In that context one of the study’s authors, Professor Luke Clancy, Director General, TFRI said that “Allen Carr is a hugely under-used treatment method which has great potential to help Ireland achieve its ambitious targets in Tobacco Control”.
The study’s first author, Sheila Keogan, TFRI’s Director of Research and Communications said, “We hope that our study showing the success of Allen Carr’s Easyway method of helping smokers to quit will be of great benefit, and may be especially useful for people who are reluctant to take any medication, for instance pregnant smokers”.
The full paper is to be found here.
ASH Ireland 