In order to help smokers in the MSU community quit the habit, Olin Health Center and Healthy U have partnered with a Web site that offers them a variety of tools.
MSU launched its portion of the site, www.QuitNet.com Monday. It is open to MSU faculty, staff, retirees and students, said Healthy U coordinator Nancy Allen.
Olin has offered Web sites to help people quit smoking before, including the site www.healthed.msu.edu/smoking.
Healthy U is MSU's health promotion program for faculty and staff.
QuitNet, which focuses on intensive personalized assistance in quitting tobacco products, confidentially connects users with a forum, a chat room and with counselors who are available by e-mail and phone, she said. It is updated on a regular basis, with a directory of quit tools and a medication guide so users can find out what therapies will work best for them.
The program was originally launched in 1995 by Boston University's School of Public Health. According to the Web site, QuitNet has saved its users a total of 64,413 years and $814,177,797 since June 1997.
MSU hopes the effort helps save its students money and their health.
About 13 percent of MSU students reported smoking on six or more of the past 30 days, at the time they were surveyed, Olin Health Center educator Rebecca Allen said. Of those students, 4 percent report daily nicotine use.
Allen said 25 percent of all MSU students used nicotine products at all in the previous 30 days.
Common among college students is social smoking, or only smoking once in awhile while partying or with friends, Rebecca Allen said. Targeting students can be difficult, she said.
"Smoking, even in small amounts, is a cost to the functioning of the immune system," she said. "Nothing is more important to students than to keep their immune systems healthy."
Social smoking is how graduate student Ian Goldberg started smoking. Goldberg, who studies industrial relations, said he started smoking about six years ago when he went to college because it was a good way to meet people.
"I was away from my parents for the first time, so smoking was kind of the cliché," he said.
He said even though the risks of smoking are obvious, with a warning right on cigarette packages, college students are too young and don't care about the health risks as much as older people do.
Another program that the health center and Healthy U offer to quit is one-on-one counseling where students can meet with Rebecca Allen to talk about their own personal use of tobacco.
"I can talk with them, go over their different options and help them make their own personal quit plan," she said.
Along with personal counseling, Nancy Allen said students are welcome to attend "quit tobacco" workshops or pick up free quit kits.
Because QuitNet is available to students all the time, even when the health center isn't open, Olin spokeswoman Kathi Braunlich said it's a program that will be more accessible to students.
