It is admittedly hard to quit smoking. Many smokers, including actress Pam Oei, successfully quit smoking for life only after five to seven attempts.

Ms Oei was smoking 20 cigarettes or more a day in 2006 and had tried to quit several times before. "I tried acupuncture, hypnotherapy, pills and nicotine replacement therapy. I'd quit for a few months and then go back to smoking.

"When I was 21, pure willpower drove me to quit for six months, but I still believed I was sacrificing a 'friend'," she said.

It was not until she went to a smoking cessation clinic - Allen Carr's Easyway To Stop Smoking - in London in 2006 that she took her last puff.

She said: "I was amazed at how easy it was to quit when it was such a struggle previously. "Once I saw through the reasons for smoking, it was easy to cope with living without it. As long as I kept attaching pleasure or value to a cigarette, I continued to be vulnerable to smoking."

Ms Oei got her smoker friends to quit with the same method and when 10 of them did so, she started training to be a therapist in the method.

She is the first in South-east Asia to be trained in Allen Carr's Easyway and runs regular sessions here (www.allencarr.com.sg).

Medical professionals said that no matter what method smokers use to help them quit, they should make sure their physiological, psychological and behavioural dependence on smoking are addressed.

Dr Kenneth Chan, a consultant at the department of respiratory and critical care medicine at Singapore General Hospital, said the most effective method is combining medication with counselling.

He said: "Medication helps with the physical effects of withdrawal while intensive support addresses psychological dependence issues like coping with stressful situations and force-of-habit issues like how to change one's daily routine."

He added that one-to-one support and advice can increase a smoker's chance of success from between 2 and 3 per cent, if a smoker depends on willpower alone, to between 10 and 15 per cent.

When counselling is combined with quit-smoking medication, the success rate further rises to between 20 and 30 per cent.

Mr Eddy Lim, a senior pharmacist at the National University Hospital, said: "There are no foolproof methods for quitting. Different smokers respond differently to the various methods available. Smokers must be ready, determined and want to quit if the quitting process is to be successful."

Ms Oei agreed that the most important aid to quitting successfully is the smoker's desire to quit.

On her own decision, she said: "I was going through my brother's ashtray one day, looking for cigarette butts I could smoke when I suddenly realised what I was doing was stupid.

"I counted the number of years I had been smoking and realised it was half my life. I'm much happier now. I'm not a slave to cigarettes anymore."

For more information on quitting smoking, log onto www.hpb.gov.sg/smoking or call QuitLine toll-free on 1800 438 2000. QuitLine is available in four official languages and is open Monday to Friday from 8.30am to 5pm and Saturday from 8.30am to 1pm.

This article was first published in Mind Your Body, The Straits Times.