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Tobacco Cessation

Smoking is the leading preventable cause of death in the United States.1 Numerous studies show that the sooner a person quits, the better their chances become at avoiding long-term complications. OptumHealth Care Solutions’ QuitPower® Advanced Tobacco Cessation program is designed to help individuals realize these health benefits by quitting tobacco for good.


1Most Behaviors Preceding Major Causes of Preventable Death Have Begun By Young Adulthood. National Institutes of Health 2006. http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/jan2006/nichd-11.htm

Studies show that people begin to show physical improvements soon after quitting. Yet, despite the health warnings, alarming statistics and immediate benefits of quitting tobacco, only three to five percent of those who try to quit succeed.7

OptumHealth Care Solutions’ QuitPower Advanced Tobacco Cessation program focuses on the following key principles:

  • Tailored therapy based on members’ readiness to change
  • Personalization to enhance self-awareness of root-cause triggers and provide shared goal-setting and decision-making, leading to self-directed achievements
  • Multi-Touch Therapy using telephonic coaching, Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT), print media, and online tools and resources, to deliver maximum results
  • System integration enabling coaches to view members’ online activity, access personal health records, review notes from prior sessions, monitor progress on goals, and coordinate with other Care Solutions services

Men who smoke incur $15,8001 (in 2002 dollars) more in lifetime medical expenses and are absent from work four days more per year than men who do not smoke.2

Women who smoke incur $17,5001 (in 2002 dollars) more in lifetime medical expenses and are absent from work two days more each year than nonsmoking women.3

In 1999, each adult smoker cost employers $1,760 in lost productivity and $1,623 in excess medical expenditures.4

Smoking causes heart disease, stroke, multiple cancers, respiratory diseases and other costly illnesses. Secondhand smoke causes lung disease and lung cancer.5,6

1Most Behaviors Preceding Major Causes of Preventable Death Have Begun By Young Adulthood.National Institutes of Health 2006.  http://www.nih.gov/news/pr/jan2006/nichd-11.htm

2Hodgson T. Cigarette smoking and lifetime medical expenditures. The Milbank Quarterly 1992;70(1):81–125.

3Warner KE, Smith RJ, Smith DG, Fries BE. Health and economic implications of a work-site smoking-cessation program: a simulation  analysis. Journal of Occupational and Environmental Medicine 1996;38(10):981–92.

4Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Annual smoking-attributable mortality, years of potential life lost, and economic costs— United States, 1995–999. MMWR 2002;51(14); 300–03.

5U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Reducing the Health Consequences of Smoking: 25 Years of Progress: A Report of  the Surgeon General: 1989 Executive Summary. Atlanta, GA: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers  for Disease  Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking  and Health; 1989.

6National Cancer Institute. Health Effects of Exposure to Environmental Tobacco Smoke. The Report of the California Environmental  Protection Agency. Smoking and Tobacco Control Monograph 10. U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, National  Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute. NIH Pub. No. 99–4645, 1999.

7Rabius, McAlister, et. al., Health Psychology, 2004, Vol. 23, No. 5, 539–541.