Metabolomische en darmmicrobiële biomarkers van het stoppen met roken bij het stoppen met roken bij langdurige medicamenteuze therapie: een gerandomiseerde gecontroleerde studie

Patients in the TAU group receive long-term rehabilitation drug treatment according to the 'community as a treatment'-model

The standard treatment within the 'Grüner Kreis' therapeutic community - which all participants will receive - consists of group therapy (once a week), individual psychotherapy (once a week), counselling by social workers, psychiatric consultations, as well as sport-, art- and work-therapy. Daily life is organized according to principles of therapeutic community-based addiction treatment.

The "smoke free in 6 weeks" program is a standardized behavioural therapy intervention that takes place once a week for 1.5 hours over 6 weeks and is provided by the Austrian health insurance provider Österreichische Gesundheitskasse (ÖGK).

The standard treatment within the 'Grüner Kreis' therapeutic community - which all participants will receive - consists of group therapy (once a week), individual psychotherapy (once a week), counselling by social workers, psychiatric consultations, as well as sport-, art- and work-therapy. Daily life is organized according to principles of therapeutic community-based addiction treatment.

Held in the therapeutic community, the intervention will employ principles of cognitive-behavioural therapy (CBT) coupled with personalized recommendations for nicotine replacement. The Austrian Health Insurance standard for therapy will be guiding the program's content, which is tailored for inpatient clients. Specifically, the following interventions based on CBT techniques will be applied in the weekly group sessions consisting of 10 to 15 participants: Psychoeducation including information on tobacco addiction, health risks, advice on relapse prevention and the handling of craving, motivation building, behavioural observation.

Control group with n=50 healthy adult subjects, examined at a single timepoint. No interventions will be administered in this arm.

Self-efficacy as a psychological variable and will be assessed by the Self-Efficacy Scale (SWE), a self-report instrument for measuring general optimistic self-confidence. It consists of 10 items and measures optimistic competence expectancy, i.e., confidence in solving difficult situations with one's own abilities.

Substance related craving will be assessed by the MaCS (Mannheim Craving Scale). consists of 12 items and four additional items and is rated on a 5- point Likert scale.

Tobacco dependence will be assessed by The Fagerström Test for Cigarette Dependence (formerly Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence; FTND). It consists of 6 categorically scaled items that assess the number of smoked cigarettes per day (CPD), compulsive use, and dependence intensity.

Primary Affects, as proposed by Jaak Panksepp will be assessed by the German Version of the Brief Affective Neuroscience Personality Scales including a LUST Scale (BANPS-GL), a self-report questionnaire.

Metabolome will be ascertained from blood via state-of-the-art NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance).

Gut microbiome will be ascertained via 16s-rRNA sequencing from stool.

Participants will be asked regarding their daily smoked cigarettes in the last two weeks (interval scaled). A second single item question will be, if participants have been completely abstinent from tobacco smoking in the last two weeks (dichotome).

For the evaluation of psychopathology, the ICD-10 Symptom Rating (ISR) questionnaire will be utilized. In accordance with the ICD-10, this self-assessment questionnaire, comprising 30 items, is designed to comprehensively assess the status and severity of mental disturbances. Symptoms of the six symptomatic patterns - depressive, anxiety, obsessive-compulsive, eating disorders, somatoform syndrome, and post-traumatic stress disorder - are assessed.