While a fear has been expressed that e-cigarettes could ‘normalise’ smoking among young people, hypnotherapy can let people stop smoking after just one session of treatment. 
Dr Ruth Hussey, the Welsh government’s chief medical officer, told the BBC earlier this month e-cigarettes are being used among young people who had never smoked before. She was commenting on a Cardiff University study which found 6% of pupils aged under 11 said they had used e-cigarettes, compared to 2% who had tried tobacco.
“This research demonstrates that e-cigarettes are being used by young people who have never smoked,” she said. “We should be doing everything we can to prevent a new generation becoming addicted to nicotine.”
The National Council for Hypnotherapy (NCH), is the UK’s leading not-for-profit professional organisation for hypnotherapists with 1800 therapists on its directory, all fully insured and trained to the highest standards.
Smoking is an unwanted habit or addiction that can be cured by hypnotherapy in just one session and statistics have shown that those who use hypnotherapy to stop smoking are three times more likely to stay smoke-free than smokers who use nicotine patches.
The national average of success rate for hypnotherapy is 60%, with anti-smoking drugs having a 2% success rate and nicotine replacement treatments (NRT) like patches and gum a 6% success rate. These rates were measured over a year with acupuncture being the next best after hypnotherapy with 185 successful treatments.
What a hypnotherapist will do to make a client beat the smoking habit is to change their beliefs about why they smoke. This is done by using the subconscious to change the thought process that makes the client want to smoke.
The therapist will, with the client’s help, look at the ‘triggers’ for smoking and find ways to ignore, forget or respond differently.
While statistics for e-cigarette addiction are not readily available, they could lead to a nicotine addiction, Dr Hussey warned and this could be borne out by a health charity estimate last year which showed that the number of people who use electronic cigarettes in the UK had tripled over two years to 2.1 million.
On a more worrying note, it added that just over half of current or ex-smokers had, by March 2014, tried electronic cigarettes, compared with 8% in 2010.
Action on Smoking and Health (ASH) surveyed more than 12,000 adult smokers while another study found that most e-cigarette users were using them to reduce smoking.
If you are worried about smoking and its effect on your health or your loved one, why not use the NCH directory by clicking here to find a therapist near you and start a path to a cleaner, healthier lifestyle.
