Dr. Frank Leone is a Professor of Medicine in the Perelman School of Medicine, University of Pennsylvania. He directs Penn's Comprehensive Smoking Treatment Program, offering multidisciplinary collaborative patient care to people suffering complex manifestations of tobacco use disorder. Dr. Leone is a Senior Fellow of the Leonard Davis Institute of Health Economics. His scholarship focuses on investigating advanced treatment strategies for tobacco use disorder and on testing strategies for improving the care of the tobacco dependent patient. Dr. Leone has published over 130 peer-reviewed papers and, along with Ms. Evers-Casey, has co-authored a clinical handbook of tobacco dependence treatment titled Why People Smoke: An Innovative Approach to Treating Tobacco Dependence.

Today on the show we discuss: why vaping isn’t actually safer than cigarettes, how vape aerosols damage your lungs and heart even without traditional carcinogens, the hidden addiction mechanics that make nicotine one of the hardest habits to break, why vaping increases anxiety, depression, and the risk of other substance addictions, how to finally quit vaping for good proven strategies, how parents and loved ones can help without judgment or shame and much more.

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