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Tackling Tobacco in Mental Health Services – translating evidence into practice

Other resource • Marty Pritchard • Shane Sweeney • Suzanne Turner • Rachel Whiffen

 

Abstract

Author(s):

Rachel Whiffen¹, Lorena Chapman¹, Marty Pritchard¹, Suzanne Turner²,
Fiona Connally², Niki Fourniotis², Shane Sweeney², Enrico Cementon³

Affiliations:

1. Quit Victoria,
2. North Western Mental health,
3. Orygen Youth Health

Recognising the significant impact that smoking has on the health of mental health consumers, Quit Victoria, North Western Mental Health partnered in 2016 to embed evidence based smoking cessation into routine care. The pilot sites chosen work with more than 1,000 consumers annually and employ approximately 280 staff.

The Tackling Tobacco Framework¹ was used to address challenges identified during initial consultations with consumers and staff and identify best-practice smoking cessation strategies. In 2017-2018, strategies implemented included:

  • Establishment of executive leadership group
  • Revision of smoke free policies and the development of smoking cessation clinical pathways
  • Delivery of staff training using the Ask, Advice, Help model, pharmacotherapies and behavioural support
  • Implementation of a range of consistent quit supports including smoking cessation peer support worker, tailored stop smoking resources for consumers and carers, and skilling of Quitline Specialists
  • Focused efforts to record consumer smoking status through a new smokefree screening and assessment tool.

Midpoint learnings based on analysis of 130 staff surveys, 180 training evaluation forms, key informant interviews, and 165 file audits indicate:

  • Staff knowledge and confidence in providing smoking cessation increased by 34%
  • 60% of staff now rate their service’s capability to provide cessation support as extremely or very capable
  • Staff members are more actively supporting consumers to quit with an increase in referrals made to Quitline
  • The smoking cessation peer support worker is a key role to support consumers to quit
  • Appropriate resources are important. To date, a total of 23,000 hard copies of the ten new Tackling Tobacco resources have been disseminated.
  • The collection of consumer’s smoking status has increased
  • That the TT Framework is adaptable across a range of service types

The presentation will detail implementation activities and evaluation findings to date.