LEWISTON — Healthy Androscoggin is accepting sign-ups for the 20th annual Quit & Win, a program that uses support, education and incentives to help people who want to stop using tobacco.
For most, that means smoking. For some these days, it means vaping — using a device to inhale a high dose of tobacco as an aerosol.
“It’s a nicotine addiction whether it’s coming from a cigarette or a nicotine device,” said Emily Dooling-Hamilton, tobacco cessation specialist with Healthy Androscoggin.
Quit & Win participants meet at the Dempsey Center in Lewiston every Wednesday evening for five weeks. The gatherings are part supportive and part educational, teaching new quitters how to get through their first few days, avoid triggers and prevent relapses. At the end, participants who attended at least four of the five meetings are entered into a raffle to win up to $250.
In recent years, about two-thirds of participants quit using tobacco by the end of the five-week program. Last year, 80 percent did, and half of them remained tobacco-free after three months.
The program is free and open to anyone who lives, works or goes to school in Androscoggin County. It starts Jan. 9 and runs through Feb. 6.
For more information or to sign up, call Healthy Androscoggin at 207-795-5990 or visit healthyandroscoggin.org.
Comments are no longer available on this story