Interest in Tobacco Treatment Delivered During Rideshare Travel

More than 37,000,000 US adults smoke cigarettes. Most are interested in quitting, but rates of successful cessation remain low. Developing more and better approaches to tobacco treatment is a public health priority. The evolution of vehicular travel may present an opportunity for tobacco treatment intervention. We recruited individuals who reported previous use of ridesharing services (eg, Uber or Lyft) at 10 sites in the Boston area. They completed an anonymous survey that collected sociodemographic and tobacco use information and assessed participants’ interest in receiving various forms of tobacco treatment during their rideshare rides. Forty-nine adult smokers completed the survey. Mean age = 40.1, 61.2% male, 51.0% white, 16.3% African American/black, 14.3% Latino, and 8.2% Asian. Almost 70% were college graduates, 79.6% worked full time, and 40.8% used ridesharing services ≥ weekly. They smoked a mean of 8.7 cigarettes per day; 35.3% were moderately or highly nicotine dependent, 36.7% also smoked cigars, 34.7% also used e-cigarettes, and 41.7% were in the contemplation or preparation stage of quitting. More than 56% of participants expressed some level of interest in receiving quit-smoking messaging during their rideshare rides. On multivariate analysis, black or Latino race/ethnicity and rideshare frequency of at least once a week were associated with interest in receiving quit-smoking messaging during rideshare rides. The majority of rideshare users who smoke are amenable to the idea of quit-smoking messaging delivered to them during their rides, and interest rates were highest among black or Latino riders and those who used rideshare services most frequently.