Kicking the habit on Owatonna

The smoking ban’s effect on the bar business can be measured in dollars and cents, but the ban’s impact on Minnesotans’ health is harder to quantify.

A survey conducted by ClearWay MinnesotaSM, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Minnesota and the Minnesota Department of Health found that statewide, the adult smoking rate has declined to 17 percent in 2007, down approximately 5 percentage points since 1999. However, the study does not reflect the effects of the smoking ban, also known as the Freedom to Breathe Act, because the data was collected before the law went into effect.

At a county level, numbers are even harder to come by. Steele County Public Health conducted an anti-smoking campaign called Save a Bundle, which ran from February 2008 until the end of June.

“We had several people that showed interest in learning how to quit, but that’s the only quantifiable measure,” said Steele County Health Educator Jane Nyquist. “And we have no way to know whether they were successful or not.”

In the doctor’s office there is some evidence that the ban has had an impact, however.

“We haven’t seen big changes in illness because there’s a lag time, but we have seen a significant increase in people trying to quit,” said Dr. Kirk Dornfeld, who works in family medicine at the Owatonna Clinic and serves as an adviser to Steele County Public Health.

And though the ban has caused furor among bar owners, the health risks of smoking are undeniable and very rarely disputed, Dornfeld said.

But that doesn’t make it easy to kick the habit. In the study, 56.7 percent of the smokers surveyed said they had tried to quit in the last year.

“It’s hard because of the strong associations

that come with smoking: Being with friends, drinking a beer, driving home from work,” Dornfeld said. “When you smoke at these times it becomes strongly associated with something that is good and the emotions and sensations you get reinforce that.”

Data collected in the survey suggested that those trying to quit are more successful when they get help. According to the report, those who used a combination of counseling and medication had the highest quit rates.

Dornfeld said smokers who wish to quit should call their primary care physician, first thing. One doctor at the Owatonna Clinic, Kellyanna Moore, specializes in helping smokers quit, Dornfeld said.

There are an array of options for smokers who wish to quit: Support groups and a wide variety of medications like nicotine gum, nicotine nasal spray, nicotine inhalers and patches. There are also two pills that have been known to help smokers quit, Chantix, a nicotine blocker and Zyban, an antidepressant.

Dornfeld said there are also a number of alternative therapies, like hypnosis or acupuncture, although the clinical benefit of these treatments has not been proven.

“They work for some people, but they haven’t been proven statistically,” Dornfeld said. “Still, success is success.”

Clare Kennedy can be reached at 444-2376.

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