Emory University researchers in Atlanta studied 639 patients who smoked at the time of their hospitalization for heart attack and found that six months later, 297 of the patients -- approximately 47 percent of them -- had quit smoking.

Dr. Susmita Parashar said the odds of quitting were greater among patients who received discharge recommendations for cardiac rehabilitation and those who were treated at a facility offering an inpatient smoking cessation program. However, individual counseling was not associated with quit rates.

"The findings are important because cardiac rehabilitation and hospital-based smoking cessation programs appear to be underutilized in current clinical practice and should be potentially considered as a structural measure of healthcare quality for patients with heart attack," Parashar said in a statement.

Cardiac rehabilitation involves beginning an exercise program, nutrition counseling and counseling on heart disease risk factors.

The findings are published in the Archives of Internal Medicine.