Introduction Woman smoking is a complicated addiction, and they always find smoking cessation difficult. A nurse-led gender-specific smoking cessation counselling program was initiated to address these problems in Hong Kong. This study aims to test the efficacy of the program at a 3-year follow-up.

Methods A gender-specific smoking cessation programme has been set up for female smokers in 2006. Women smokers aged 15 years or above and smoked in the past month were recruited to receive 3-sessions of individualised face-to-face stage-matched smoking cessation counselling at baseline, 1-week, and 1-month. They were followed up at 6 month, 1 year, and 3 years to assess their smoking status. We reported the quit rate and compared changes in their cigarette consumption from baseline to 3 year.

Results From November 2006 to November 2010, we received over 800 inquires and provided smoking cessation counselling to 386 eligible female smokers. A total of 174 participants were eligible for follow-up at 3 years, and 130 (74.7%) were successfully contacted. Participants aged 36 years (range: 15–74), had smoked for 18.2 years (SD=8.9) with a mean daily consumption of 15.4 cigarettes (SD=8.8). Using intention-to-treat analysis, the self-reported 7-day point prevalence quit rate was 11.4% (44/386). Among those continued to smoke (n=84), the cigarette consumption reduced from 16.0±9.4 to 11.9±8.0 (p<0.001) on average; and 29.8% (n=25) had reduced cigarette consumption by at least half.

Conclusion The gender-specific cessation programme seemed to be effective in promoting smoking cessation and reduction among Chinese female smokers in Hong Kong.