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Smoking Cessation Community

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Jonathan Foulds, PhD

Joined: 12/13/2010

Expert Profile:

Jonathan Foulds, PhD. is a Professor of Public Health Sciences at Penn State University, College of Medicine. After obtaining a first class honors degree in psychology at University of Aberdeen in Scotland, he trained as a clinical psychologist at the University of Glasgow, and then spent most of his career developing and evaluating methods to help smokers beat their addiction to tobacco. He obtained his PhD at the Institute of Psychiatry, University of London and then worked at St George's Hospital Medical School as the UK's first "lecturer in tobacco addiction". He then moved to University of Surrey and continued to work as a principal clinical psychologist at Broodmoor Hospital, a large maximum security facility for mentally disordered offenders. He was on the Management Group of the Hungarian Anti-Smoking Campaign (1995-6), has been a technical leader of a World Health Organization project to improve the regulation of tobacco dependence treatment in Europe (2000), and was Director of Research for the UK charity, Quit, which ran the largest telephone helpline for smokers in the world at that time. He was a founding member and Vice President of the Association for the Treatment of Tobacco Use and Dependence (ATTUD) 2004-6. Dr Foulds has received funding support on grants totaling well over $7 million from a various public and private organizations (including New Jersey Department of Health and Senior Services, CDC and the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation). He has worked as a paid consultant for a number of agencies involved in promoting health, including pharmaceutical companies involved in production of tobacco dependence treatment medications (e.g. Pfizer, GSK, Novartis). He has been invited to speak on smoking cessation in over 15 countries, and has published over 80 papers on tobacco and health in peer-reviewed scientific journals. He continues to treat addicted smokers, teach on smoking cessation and conduct research on tobacco and health at Penn State College of Medicine in Hershey, PA.

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Reply: The flu and smoking

Well done for quitting smoking. Are you still quit, and have the coughing and...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

3 Replies | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:The flu and smoking Well done for quitting smoking. Are you still quit, and have the coughing and...

Reply: How long before Nicotine is out of system?

Most likely they didn't test for nicotine, but cotinine (the main nicotine...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

8 Replies | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:How long before Nicotine is out of system? Most likely they didn't test for nicotine, but cotinine (the main nicotine...

Reply: Electronic Cigarettes?

Jeremy, I believe you are very likely correct that electronic cigarettes are...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

70 Replies | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:Electronic Cigarettes? Jeremy, I believe you are very likely correct that electronic cigarettes are...

Reply: pipes

Although there are studies showing that long term pipe smoking can cause...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

1 Reply | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:pipes Although there are studies showing that long term pipe smoking can cause...

What quitting method has highest fail rate?

It is often stated that most smokers who quit, do so without any assistance....

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

1 Reply | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:What quitting method has highest fail rate? It is often stated that most smokers who quit, do so without any assistance....

Reply: blood test

So long as you not actively consumed any nicotine (i.e. no tobacco or nicotine...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

1 Reply | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:blood test So long as you not actively consumed any nicotine (i.e. no tobacco or nicotine...

Reply: best product to help quit?

Nicotine patch and gum are about equally successful. If you smoke more than 10...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

2 Replies | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:best product to help quit? Nicotine patch and gum are about equally successful. If you smoke more than 10...

Reply: quit smoking

It is normal to experience increased appetite, moodiness and short temper for...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

1 Reply | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:quit smoking It is normal to experience increased appetite, moodiness and short temper for...

Reply: Study finds no increase in cardiovascular events w...

When you are prescribed Chantix by your healthcare provider it should come...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

2 Replies | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:Study finds no increase in cardiovascular events with varenicline (Chantix) When you are prescribed Chantix by your healthcare provider it should come...

Smoking cessation medicines increase quit rates in...

Smoking cessation medicines such as nicotine replacement therapy, varenicline...

Posted by Jonathan Foulds, PhD

Smoking cessation medicines such as nicotine replacement therapy, varenicline and bupropion have consistently been shown to increase quit rates in randomized placebo-controlled clinical trialsâ€¦.generally regarded as the best way to find out if a medicine does what it is supposed to and is safe. However, some survey studies, which asked people how they tried and succeeded in quitting did not find that people who used these same medicines had higher quit rates. A number of reasons have been put forward to explain these different results in different types of study. These include the possibility that people who volunteer for clinical trials may be different in some way from people who try the same medicines in the "real world" (e.g they might be more addicted). Another possible explanation is that smokers participating in surveys in which they are asked to recall previous quit attempts may forget some attempts where they tried on their own, but are more likely to recall quit attempts where they used a medicine.

A large study that sheds light on these issues was recently published in the journal Addiction. Dr Karin Kasza and colleagues surveyed over 7000 smokers every 6 months from 2002 to 2009, asking them about their quit attempts since their last interview. They found that, consistent with evidence from randomized controlled trials, smokers in the United Kingdom, Canada, Australia and the United States are more likely to succeed in quit attempts if they use varenicline, bupropion or nicotine patch, compared with trying to quit without a medicine. They also found that quit attempts that did not use a medicine were more likely to be forgotten at subsequent interviews, explaining why previous studies did not find a higher quit rate with medicines (failed attempts without medication more likely to be forgotten than failed attempts with medicine). It is reassuring to know that the pattern of results found in clinical trials also applies in the "real world" too, and that these medications are effective in helping smokers quit.

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0 Replies | Reply | Watch This DiscussionReport This| Share this:Smoking cessation medicines increase quit rates in 4-country study Smoking cessation medicines such as nicotine replacement therapy, varenicline...

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