Why Nicotine Patches Have a 94% Failure Rate

Featured image for “Why Nicotine Patches Have a 94% Failure Rate”

Yes, you read that correctly; the success rate of the nicotine patch, nicotine gum, sprays and lozenges is less than 10%.

It’s near impossible to get a recent accurate figure from Google, but an independent scientific study* conducted shows a success rate of 3.4% for cold turkey and 6.2% for the nicotine patch.

When Big Pharma tell you their products will ‘double your chance of success’, they’re being honest. Double your chances of not much is still not much!

So where does that leave you? The important thing for you to understand is why they have such low success rates.

You’ve probably been led to believe it’s because smokers are weak and lack willpower, but this simply isn’t true. Ask yourself what lengths you’d go to if you ran out of cigarettes late at night?

I once had a client who cycled 4.5miles in the pouring rain at 2am to buy a packet of smokes. That is not a lack of willpower!!

There are two main reasons why nicotine patches, gum and sprays don’t work:

  1. They keep you physically addicted to nicotine which leaves you wanting more of the drug;

But more importantly,

  1. They don’t address the psychological addiction, your desire to want to smoke and the belief that you’re ‘giving something up’. As a former smoker myself I could stick a nicotine patch on my arm or chew on gum but not once did it remove my desire to want to smoke. It just left me feeling miserable and deprived and desperate for a cigarette.

Think about it. If cigarette cravings were due to nicotine withdrawal or a lack of nicotine, all smokers would be fine after 5 days of abstinence once the nicotine has left their bloodstream.

But they’re not, and the reason they’re not is because smoking is 1% physical and 99% mental.

Why else would a smoker crave a cigarette weeks, months or even years after quitting?

Trying to fix a psychological issue with a physical product just doesn’t work, hence their ridiculously low success rates or insanely high failure rates.

Smoking is 99% mental so you need a psychological solution to fix a psychological problem. Every Allen Carr facilitator was once a smoker ourselves and we all quit this way so we understand how smokers think. More importantly, we can show you how to quit easily and happily.

*Source: Journal Addictive Behaviours, Nov 2006.

 

Image

get started

Your smoke free life starts here!

Sign up for free advice, support and resources to start you on your quit smoking journey.

Get Started