The study assigned 609 pregnant smokers to cessation therapies, including a face-to-face counseling session followed by four weekly phone calls and 10 weeks of free nicotine therapy. Half of the participants were also offered shopping vouchers for meeting certain goals, such as showing up for counseling, passing a breath test for going two weeks without smoking and remaining smoke-free for longer periods of time, according to the report.
The pregnant women offered financial incentives were 2.63 times more likely to quit smoking, the researchers found. Out of the 306 women eligible to receive shopping vouchers, 69 stopped smoking and were still smoke-free when they were 34 to 38 weeks along in their pregnancies, while only 26 of the 303 women in the control group were smoke-free, according to the report.
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