DR WHO has a handy knack of regenerating. A bit of computer wizardry and suddenly there he is with a whole new face, sometimes older, sometimes younger.

Sadly, we don't have the same capacity to change our appearance when the going gets tough, but some computer wizardry in the Guildhall Square last week gave people the chance to see how they could change their appearance in years to come, just by quitting smoking.

South Wiltshire's NHS Stop Smoking Service team were in the city with a trailer and computer software on loan from nicotine replacement company NiQuitin CQ.

The programme takes a facial image from a digital photograph and creates a series of images illustrating how that face is likely to age over a period of years up to the age of 72.

Each age point puts two images side by side - the person as they would appear if they either gave up smoking or do not smoke at all, and what they would look like if they are smokers and continue to smoke.

While none of us look forward to old age, what was immediately evident to everyone who tried out the programme was that the future (and their facial appearance) was definitely brighter, less lined, less grey-skinned, less weary-eyed and infinitely less wrinkled, as a non-smoker.

Amanda Rossiter, 32, has been smoking for 15 years and reckons she has a 20 cigarettes a day habit.

It made be feel ill looking at it, and a bit scared,'' she admitted.

I'd rather be the non-smoking one definitely.

I shall be down to my GP on Monday.'' Kevin Card is the security manager at Cross Keys Chequer and has been smoking since he was 11 years old.

He estimates his daily cigarette consumption as 40+, but says that seeing himself 30 years down the line was a bit of a wake-up call.

What you see is very impressive - it does scare you,'' he said.

Simon Wells, 46, of Fovant, a smoker of 26 years' standing, said he had already made up his mind to quit.

I've thought about it a lot and I'm down to my last two packs of tobacco,'' he said.

After seeing his image on the screen on the computer as a 72-year-old smoker, he added: Or I'll end up looking like something from the Wizard of Oz.'' Maggie Thornton, who leads the Stop Smoking team based at the Barcroft Medical Centre in Amesbury, was delighted with the response from passers-by.

She said that one of the team's priorities during the day was to target pregnant women, because of the importance of discontinuing smoking during pregnancy for the baby's health as well as the mother's-to-be. Among the visitors was a group of Year Six pupils from Leaden Hall School with their teacher, England women's rugby international Emily Cooke. The girls faced the future as each was aged six decades by the computer. The effect of smoke on girls who had never smoked (and were quite emphatic that they never would) was marked by deep furrows and dull skin should they fall prey to the lure of nicotine in later years.

Several teenagers admitted that it was peer pressure and the fact that the majority of their mates were smokers that made it difficult for them to stand out from the crowd and say no.

The team was also testing levels of carbon monoxide in smokers. In some cases, they got quite a shock,'' says Maggie.

Smoking blocks all the oxygen going round the body. The side smoke when you inhale and exhale has got all the dangerous chemicals in it - it's really toxic stuff - that goes onto your skin. Surgeons say that the skin and bones of people who smoke heal much more slowly and the effects of smoking can lead to complications during recovery.'' By the end of the day, the service had advised around 75 smokers on the internal and external dangers of puffing deadly toxins and the benefits of quitting.

Most people who had approached them, she said, had been smokers who genuinely wanted to quit or reformed smokers, who had given up the weed, and wanted to know what they would have looked like had they carried on.

Most of them have been younger, under 40, with a lot in the 17-25 age bracket,'' she said.

I think a lot of them were planning to quit, but what they saw shocked them. Two young girls of 17 and 18 actually walked straight round to their doctors and made appointments.''

  • For more information on quitting smoking, visit your GP or contact the NHS Stop Smoking Service on 01980 626159.