Feasibility & acceptability of novel smoking cessation smartphone sensing app delivering support by realtime events

Three million smokers try to stop smoking every year in the UK. However, most of these attempts fail. One of the main reasons for this is because smokers experience cues or triggers to smoke from their surroundings, such as seeing others smoke. Using a coping strategy can help smokers resist smoking or avoid these situations. However, smokers do not always use coping strategies effectively and most of those attempting to quit go back to smoking (relapse) within 4 weeks. The proposed research will explore a new way of helping smokers manage these types of situations using a smartphone app. One of the core features of this app is a smartphone sensing system. This system asks smokers to log information about each smoking episode before starting a quit attempt. Every time they do this the phone uses its in-built sensors (e.g. Global Positioning System, GPS) to record their location. Once they start their quit attempt, as well as receiving standard support, the app delivers advice and support when they approach or are positioned in the location of one of those past smoking episodes. We plan to assess the feasibility (does it do what it is meant to?) and acceptability (do smokers find this type of support helpful?) of this app using smokers in two studies. This will help us learn how we might improve the app and the way we study it in order to test it out in a larger study.

"Three million UK adult smokers attempt to quit smoking each year. However, most of these attempts fail, caused in part by a failure to manage cravings brought about by a smoking cue from the environment. These are implicated in almost half of all smoking lapses1 and are not alleviated by the most commonly used cessation medications. The use of behavioural coping strategies can help smokers manage these cue-induced craving episodes without lapsing. However, most smokers either fail to use a coping strategy or use them inadequately during these episodes and relapse within 4 weeks of a quit attempt, even after receiving cessation counselling and pharmacological support.
The proposed research will assess the feasibility and acceptability of a novel type of smoking cessation smartphone app we have developed to help smokers avoid or cope with cue induced craving episodes. This app (QSense) builds on two tailored SMS text message support systems for smoking cessation that we have developed and evaluated (MiQuit and iQuit) and combines the existing tailored message libraries with a smartphone sensing system. This sensing system will deliver real-time behavioural support triggered by a smoker’s proximity to a pre-identified high risk location for a cue-induced craving episode, using location sensors in their smartphone (e.g. the Global Positioning System, GPS). We propose two studies (‘early phase studies’) to guide continued intervention development and inform the parameters of a future explanatory randomised controlled trial (‘main study’). Study 1 will assess the feasibility of using the sensing system when integrated into a smoking cessation app running on smokers’ personal smartphones (N=15). After an intervention refinement phase, study 2 will use mixed methods to assess the acceptability and usage of the refined app among smokers accessing smoking cessation support at their local GP practice (N=40).
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