Subtheme 1.1: Integration supports mental health treatment and understanding
anxiety
Participants described how they thought IAPT treatment models, such as CBT, ‘worked well’ with quitting smoking and how the integrated treatment benefitted mental health recovery.
Participants perceived that once the link between smoking and mental health was explained by the therapist, it ‘made sense’ that smoking and anxiety were related. Participants described how smoking acted as a ‘component’ of their anxiety, as a ‘temporary relief’, which then made them ‘feel worse’. Some participants described the physical effects of smoking, such as increased heart rate, relating this to anxiety in a ‘vicious cycle’.