It\u2019s a six-week contest, opening Jan. 25, that challenges participants to change their smoking behaviours at various levels. Registration for the contest closes at midnight on Jan. 24.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe\u2019re giving people a really powerful trigger and motivator to quit,\u201d says Lawrance, associate professor in Brock\u2019s Department of Health Sciences. \u201cThey can win big money prizes and know they\u2019re with a community of other people who are trying to quit at the same time as them.\u201d<\/p>\n
There are four categories in the wouldurather\u00a0contest<\/a>: Quit for Good (stop smoking altogether); Keep the Count (cut smoking by 50 per cent); Party Without the Smoke (cut out smoking when drinking alcohol); and Don\u2019t Start and Win (non-smokers and ex-smokers staying smoke free).<\/p>\n \u201cUp to 20 per cent of those entering the contest will go on to quit smoking for good, depending on the category they enter,\u201d explains Leave The Pack Behind manager Heather Travis. \u201cThey\u2019re building their confidence in themselves and in their skills and seeing that they can quit tobacco.\u201d<\/p>\n The contest is one of many tools that researchers and staff use in the Leave The Pack Behind program, a province-wide tobacco control initiative started by Brock University that offers young adults smoking and quitting information, resources and personalized support.<\/p>\n Lawrance and two colleagues, Melodie Shick Porter, Director Student Health Services, and Sharon Lawler, Niagara Public Health, created Leave The Pack Behind in the bad old days when cigarettes were sold on university and college campuses, student residences had smoking and non-smoking rooms, and so-called \u201ccigarette girls\u201d peddled smokes at campus pub events sponsored by tobacco companies.<\/p>\n Students at Brock University in 1969 can be seen working near ashtrays in this archive photo.<\/p><\/div>\n Lawrance devised a plan in which student research teams, peer educators and doctors and nurses on post-secondary campuses would help students reduce, eliminate or avoid tobacco use.<\/p>\n With a modest grant from the Ontario Ministry of Health, Lawrance reached out to five other post-secondary institutions to launch the Leave The Pack Behind Program in 2000.<\/p>\n Sixteen years later, with funding close to $1 million annually, Leave The Pack Behind is found on every university and college campus and in 36 public health units across Ontario. All young adults from 18-29 years old are able to access, at no charge, such resources as a series of Quit Smoking booklets, programs and tips on the website, counselling and, while supplies last, nicotine gum and patches. Social media and smoke-free policies are also used to support smoke-free living.<\/p>\n But Leave The Pack Behind is not just a service. The program is also a platform for Lawrance\u2019s ongoing research on how and why young adult smokers quit, what strategies they prefer, the outcomes of these strategies, and whether health professionals support smoking cessation among older teens and young adults.<\/p>\n One discovery in Lawrance\u2019s research, for example, is that when health professionals ask young people if they are smokers, many young people answer that they are not, when in fact they smoke during parties, in pubs or other situations.<\/p>\n \u201cWe were missing many, many opportunities to intervene with people who smoke,\u201d says Lawrance, adding that in subsequent medical education sessions, health care professionals were encouraged to ask young adults, \u201cdo you ever smoke cigarettes\u201d instead of, \u201care you a smoker?\u201d<\/p>\n She and her research team also found that most campus physicians ask their patients about their smoking, but few provide identified smokers with support for quitting. Also, many young adults believe that their smoking is just a temporary phase that they can end fairly easily. Most young adult smokers say they want to quit.<\/p>\n Regarding interventions, \u201cmostly what we find is that people just want to quit on their own,\u201d says Lawrance. \u201cThey really want to take the little booklets, they want to read the booklets, get the information online and quit.\u201d<\/p>\n![\"Students](\"http:\/\/brocku.ca\/brock-news\/wp-content\/uploads\/2016\/01\/07-students-at-work-1969-1050x836.jpg\")