Background: To describe patterns of quit attempts amongst 15 to 19 year olds who regularly smoke and to explore their preferences for cessation services used.

Method: The New Zealand Tobacco Use Survey (NZTUS) was administered using Computer Assisted Personal Interviewing to a nationally representative sample of New Zealanders; 756 aged 15 to 19 years. The survey contained questions about desire to quit, quit attempts and utilisation of cessation services.

Results: Preliminary results indicate that a high percentage of New Zealand youth want to quit. Of 176 regular smokers identified, 85 (48.3%) expressed some motivation to quit. Males were more likely to be thinking about quitting than females (OR, 1.14, 95% CI, 1.10, 1.18). Many had made numerous quit attempts over the past 12 months, with 63.1% having ever quit for more than a week. Males are less likely to have tried to stop smoking altogether compared to females (OR, 0.97, 95% CI, 0.94, 1.00). Various cessation services were utilised during these quit attempts, the most popular was receiving advice from friends and/or family. The Quitline and other stop smoking programmes were also popular. Nicotine patches were the most popular NRT products used.

Conclusions: These results indicate that a large number of regular smokers aged 15 to 19 in New Zealand want to quit smoking.

Implications: There are several services currently available to help smokers quit, however all are aimed primarily at adults. Given the demand for quitting support, there is a need for services and products to be developed for and promoted to youth.