Text messages could be key to helping TB patients quit smoking, according to study
Posted on 22 December 2025
Image: Simon Reza, Unsplash.com.
As part of the trial, patients were sent encouraging and supportive text messages to see if it would help them to quit smoking more quickly.
Results
The results, published in the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA), revealed that nearly three times the number of participants who received text messages quit smoking for six months, compared to participants receiving the standard printed information.
The study, part of the RESPIRE project, was led by Professor Kamran Siddiqi, a Professor of Public Health in the Hull York Medical School and Ai Keow Lim, from the University of Edinburgh.
Professor Siddiqi said: “We know that people who quit smoking can recover from TB faster, so we tested whether sending encouraging and supportive text messages could help patients quit more quickly than the usual written advice.”
Access
Professor Siddiqi explained the study - which took place in Bangladesh and Pakistan - included 1,080 people with access to a mobile phone who had TB.
“Of the 1,080 participants, 720 received text massages to encourage quitting daily for two months, then monthly for four months," said Professor Siddiqi. The remaining 360 participants received standard printed information about quitting smoking.
The results are impressive, with a huge difference in quitting success rates between the groups.
“We found that more than 41% of the text-message group quit smoking for six months, compared to only just over 15% of the usual-care group,” he said. “Also, the text-message groups had lower death rates, 3.5%, than the usual-care group which recorded a 7.5% death rate.”
Effective
Professor Siddiqi believes the text-message method is both effective and practical way to help people give up smoking when they need to most - ie when they’re being treated for TB.
And he says it could be a particularly useful method where resources are scarce.
“This method of patient help could be particularly useful where face-to-face smoking cessation services are non-existent. Sending mobile phone messages offers a cheap and effective way of helping people to quit in large numbers.
“The study shows that this approach not only prevents other tobacco related conditions including cancer and heart diseases but also saves lives in the short-term by reducing TB-related deaths.”
Read the paper: Zahid M, Rahman F, Danaee M, et al. An mHealth (mobile health) intervention for smoking cessation in people with tuberculosis: a cluster randomized clinical trial. JAMA. Published online December 22, 2025.
Further information:
NIHR Global Health Research Unit on Respiratory Health (RESPIRE)
RESPIRE aims to reduce the number of deaths and wider health and societal impacts from respiratory diseases in South Asia.
Co-led by the University of Edinburgh and Universiti Malaya, RESPIRE partners based in Bangladesh, Bhutan, India, Indonesia, Malaysia, Pakistan, and Sri Lanka collaborate to deliver low-cost, scalable policy and clinical interventions to reduce respiratory disease and death in Asia. RESPIRE’s research programmes cover infectious diseases - for example tuberculosis and pneumonia, non-communicable diseases - including asthma and chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, preventable risk factors - such as air quality and tobacco usage, and the impact of climate change on respiratory health.
RESPIRE is funded by NIHR (GHR 16/136/109 and NIHR132826) using UK international development funding from the UK Government to support global health research. The views expressed in this publication are those of the author(s) and not necessarily those of the NIHR or the UK government.
Learn more at usher.ed.ac.uk/respire/ or @RESPIREGlobal on LinkedIn, Twitter/X or Facebook
The National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR)
The mission of the National Institute for Health and Care Research (NIHR) is to improve the health and wealth of the nation through research.
We do this by:
- funding high quality, timely research that benefits the NHS, public health and social care
- investing in world-class expertise, facilities and a skilled delivery workforce to translate discoveries into improved treatments and services
- partnering with patients, service users, carers and communities, improving the relevance, quality and impact of our research
- attracting, training and supporting the best researchers to tackle complex health and social care challenges
- collaborating with other public funders, charities and industry to help shape a cohesive and globally competitive research system
- funding applied global health research and training to meet the needs of the poorest people in low and middle income countries
NIHR is funded by the Department of Health and Social Care.
Our work in low and middle income countries is principally funded through UK international development funding from the UK government.
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