In 2004, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) collaborated with the Department of Health and Human Services to establish a National Network of Tobacco Cessation Quitlines. Tobacco use is the major, avoidable cause of illness and death in the United States, accounting for 435,000 deaths each year (2005).

Quitlines are telephone-based programs for helping tobacco users quit. Tobacco users initiate contact with a quitline, and services may include mailed materials, recorded messages, counseling at the time of call, callback from a counselor, access to cessation medication, or some combination of these services. Most services are free to the caller.

There is also a growing trend toward combining telephone counseling with cessation medication provided in the form of nicotine patches, gum, or bupropion. About one third of U.S. quitlines include some kind of Internet service and with the popularity of Web-based behavioral interventions, it is likely that there will be greater integration of telephone counseling with Internet programs.