Zigmars Dzerve
Founder of Burnout
I built Burnout — an app that times nicotine leaving your blood from your own last cigarette and marks the recovery milestones after it — and I research and write everything published on this site: 81 guides across 9 topics, plus 17 free calculators.
I am not a doctor, nurse or researcher, and I do not pretend to be. I am a developer who had to read the actual literature to build a quit-smoking app that models recovery honestly — nicotine and cotinine clearance, the withdrawal curve, what a milestone at two weeks is really based on. Most of what I found online was either clinical and unreadable, or confident and sourced to nothing. So I write the version I wanted: the documents in plain language, with the links, so you can check me.
In practice that means every health claim here points at a primary source — WHO, the NHS, the CDC, the 2020 Surgeon General’s report, or the paper itself — and keeps that source’s own hedges and windows. It also means nothing here is clinically reviewed, because there is no clinician on staff to review it. I would rather say that plainly than imply a credential I do not have.
How I work
- Primary documents, opened. Health claims come from public-health bodies and peer-reviewed papers, not from other blogs. No URL is cited that was not read.
- The hedge stays on. These bodies publish windows, not instants. Where a source says “up to” or gives a range of months, so does the page.
- Where they disagree, I print the disagreement. Four bodies give four answers for when heart risk halves. Picking the friendliest one is how a timeline stops being true.
- My numbers are labelled mine. The phase boundaries, the absorption factors, the withdrawal curve — nobody publishes those. Where a figure is ours the page says so and cites nobody for it.
- No diagnosis, no prescriptions. These are guides. Anything involving medication or a diagnosis belongs with a clinician.
- Corrections welcome. If something here is wrong or out of date, tell me and I will fix it and move the update date.
The full detail is in the editorial policy.
What Burnout is
A quit-smoking, quit-vaping and quit-pouches tracker. It counts from your own last cigarette, times the nicotine clearing your blood, and marks each recovery milestone with the body that published it and the window that body actually gives. There is no account and no sign-in — your records are kept on your own device.
Recently updated
- How Your Lungs Heal After Quitting Smoking How your lungs recover after quitting smoking: when airway clearing speeds up, when breathing and lung function improve, and what COPD means — each step linked to its source. Last updated Oct 5, 2026 · 6 min read
- Nicotine Replacement Therapy Guide: Patches, Gum, Lozenges, and More NRT guide: patches, gum, lozenges, sprays and inhalators. What the Cochrane reviews found, why combining products works best, how long to use them, and safety. Last updated Oct 5, 2026 · 7 min read
- Nicotine Tolerance: How It Develops and What It Means How nicotine tolerance builds through receptor desensitisation and upregulation, why the first cigarette of the day hits hardest, and how tolerance fades after you quit. Last updated Oct 5, 2026 · 6 min read
- Vaping vs Smoking: Which Is Actually Worse? An evidence-based comparison of vaping vs smoking — chemical exposure, cancer risk, cardiovascular effects, addiction potential, and the 95% safer claim. Last updated Oct 5, 2026 · 6 min read
- Best Quit Smoking Apps 2026: An Honest Comparison The quit smoking apps worth knowing about: NHS Quit Smoking, quitSTART, Smoke Free, Kwit, QuitNow and EasyQuit — with what the published evidence shows. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 13 min read
- How Breathing Improves After Quitting Smoking Breathing starts improving within days of quitting smoking. The timeline for lung recovery — carbon monoxide, airway clearing, lung function, exercise — with each step sourced. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 5 min read
- Carbon Monoxide and Smoking: What It Does to Your Blood Every cigarette loads your blood with carbon monoxide, which blocks oxygen delivery. How it works, what smokers' levels are, and how fast it clears after quitting. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 6 min read
- Carbon Monoxide and Smoking: The Invisible Harm in Every Cigarette How carbon monoxide in cigarette smoke harms your body: the mechanism of hemoglobin displacement, chronic hypoxia effects, and how fast CO clears after quitting. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 4 min read
- What's in a Cigarette: 7,000 Chemicals and 69 Carcinogens Cigarette smoke contains more than 7,000 chemicals, at least 69 of them cancer-causing (NCI). What's actually in cigarettes, and what the main chemicals do. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 6 min read
- What Is Cotinine? The Nicotine Test Explained Cotinine is what nicotine tests actually detect. What it is, its 16-hour half-life, what the cut-offs mean, and which tests can tell NRT apart from tobacco. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 5 min read
- Dopamine and Nicotine Addiction: Why Quitting Is Hard How nicotine uses the brain's dopamine reward system, what brain scans show in smokers, why the first weeks off cigarettes feel flat, and how the system recovers. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 7 min read
- Energy Levels After Quitting Smoking: What to Expect Feeling tired after quitting smoking? What the sleep studies measured, why the tiredness is temporary, and why the NHS says your energy increases from about 72 hours. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 5 min read
- Hair Changes After Quitting Smoking: What Actually Happens Smokers have higher rates of male-pattern hair loss and early greying. What the studies show, what quitting can and can't change, and why nobody has measured hair after quitting. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 4 min read
- How Long Do Cigarette Cravings Last? The Real Answer The NHS says a craving usually lasts a few minutes and at most about 15. Here is what that means, and how cravings change over the weeks and years after quitting. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 7 min read
- How Long Does Nicotine Stay in Your Body? Blood, Urine, Hair Tests How long nicotine and cotinine stay in your body, why no one can promise you an exact test window, and which tests can tell NRT from tobacco. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 5 min read
- How Much Nicotine Is in a Vape? Juul, Elf Bar & More Compared Compare nicotine content in Juul pods, Elf Bar, Lost Mary, and other vapes. See cigarette equivalencies, mg/mL breakdowns, and why comparisons are imprecise. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 8 min read
- How Nicotine Binds to Receptors in Your Brain Nicotine hijacks acetylcholine receptors in your brain, triggering dopamine release and creating dependence. Here's the exact mechanism, explained clearly. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 6 min read
- How to Handle Nicotine Cravings: Evidence-Based Strategies That Work What a nicotine craving is, how long one lasts, and what the evidence says works when it hits — from exercise and urge surfing to using NRT properly. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 8 min read
- How to Quit Smoking for Good: What Long-Term Quitters Do Differently What separates people who quit smoking for good from those who relapse? The behavioral science behind long-term cessation and the specific strategies that work. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 5 min read
- How to Quit Vaping: A Complete Guide A practical guide to quitting vaping: tapering, cold turkey, NRT and varenicline, and habit changes — with what the thin vaping evidence shows and where advice comes from smoking. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 6 min read
- Hypnosis to Quit Smoking: Does It Actually Work? What the clinical evidence actually shows about hypnosis for smoking cessation — randomized trials, comparison to NRT, and what hypnotherapy can and can't do. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 5 min read
- Is Vaping Bad for You? What the Research Actually Shows What science actually says about vaping health risks — respiratory, cardiovascular, and oral effects, what's in vape aerosol, and what we still don't know. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 5 min read
- Lung Cilia Recovery After Quitting Smoking Smoking slows the cilia that clean your airways. What the studies measured after quitting — clearance back to normal in about two weeks — and what nobody has measured yet. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 6 min read
- Nicotine Addiction: How It Works and Why It's So Hard to Quit The science of nicotine addiction: fast delivery, dopamine, receptor changes, learned triggers and genes — and why more people who try cigarettes get hooked than with most drugs. Last updated Sep 25, 2026 · 6 min read