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New grant helps employee dependents stop smoking

If you're trying to quit smoking but your spouse or adult children continue to smoke, your chances of success diminish. Now, through a grant from the Partnership for Prevention and the New York State Smoker's Quitline, dependents of Upstate employees can obtain a month's supply of tobacco cessation products for free, or up to $50 in copayment costs.

A dependent is a person age 18 or older who is covered by the employee's health plan.

The program begins Monday, July 16 and continues until the grant money runs out. Sign up by contacting Wellness Coordinator Suzanne Brisk at 464-4565. Patches, medications, gums and lozenges -- some of which require a prescription -- can be obtained at the Upstate Medical University Rite Aid on the first floor of the hospital.

If additional tobacco cessation products are needed after the 30-day supply runs out, and if grant money remains, dependents can reapply for coverage. They will be required to attend coaching classes before receiving additional products.

Upstate was the first school in the SUNY system to go smoke free, in 2005.

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