Source: Philadelphia (PA) Daily News
Date: 2010-02-18
Author: Becky Batcha  Daily News Staff Writer,

Smokers are two to four times more likely to develop heart
disease than nonsmokers.

That said, quitting can start to turn things around almost
instantly. "It\'s really quite striking how rapidly you get
benefits," says Russell Luepker, a cardiologist at the University
of Minnesota and an expert on smoking cessation.

Within just two or three weeks, a former smoker\'s circulation
improves. After just a year, the extra risk to his heart drops by
half.

Smokers get it. Forty percent try to quit every year.

While the odds for success are long - less than 3 percent of
quitters "stay quit" for a year, to use the voguish term for
kicking the habit - research shows that several approaches can
vastly improve the odds.

Cold, hard cash. Philadelphia researcher Kevin Volpp, director
of the Center for Health Incentives at the University of
Pennsylvania School of Medicine and the Wharton School, has
gotten good results paying people to quit.