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Objectives: Cigarette smoking negatively affects oral health. Nicotine replacement therapies (NRT; e.g. nicotine patch or lozenge) and brief interventions (e.g. Ask‐Advise‐Refer; AAR) can improve cessation outcomes but are underutilized. NRT sampling (NRTS) increases NRT utilization by providing patients with samples of NRT as part of routine healthcare. Ask‐Advise‐Refer is a brief intervention where practitioners: ask patients about tobacco use, advise those using tobacco to quit and refer to the state quit line. The objective of this qualitative study was to explore dental care practitioners' and patients' attitudes and experiences regarding tobacco cessation treatment and perceptions of two brief intervention models, assessed separately: NRTS and AAR. Methods: Twenty‐four dental care practitioners and nine patients, recruited through the National Dental Practice‐Based Research Network, participated in semi‐structured telephone interviews. Interviews assessed experiences with tobacco use intervention and attitudes towards NRTS and AAR. Thematic analysis identified emergent themes related to feasibility and acceptability of NRTS and AAR. Results: Practitioners varied on how they address tobacco use, from systematically to idiosyncratically. Some practitioners recommend NRT; few had prescribed it. Practitioners had favourable attitudes towards AAR and NRTS, with most believing that both interventions would be acceptable and feasible to implement. Concerns regarding AAR were time and patient resistance to discussing tobacco use. Concerns regarding NRTS were patient resistance to using NRT, side effects or medication interactions, and capacity to provide follow‐up. Patients reported that oral health practitioners generally ask about tobacco use but do not provide interventions. Patients were open to discussing their tobacco use with practitioners and had favourable attitudes about NRTS. Conclusions: This formative work suggests that NRTS and AAR may be feasible to implement in dental care settings. Future studies are needed to assess the effectiveness and implementation potential of NRTS in dental care settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Annual lung cancer screening (LCS) with low dose CT reduces lung cancer mortality. LCS is underutilized. Black people who smoke tobacco have high risk of lung cancer but are less likely to be screened than are White people. This study reports provider recommendation and patient completion of LCS and colorectal cancer screening (CRCS) among patients by race to assess for utilization of LCS. Methods: 3000 patients (oversampled for Black patients) across two healthcare systems (in Rhode Island and Minnesota) who had a chart documented age of 55 to 80 and a smoking history were invited to participate in a survey about cancer screening. Logistic regression analysis compared the rates of recommended and received cancer screenings. Results: 1177 participants responded (42% response rate; 45% White, 39% Black). 24% of respondents were eligible for LCS based on USPSTF2013 criteria. One-third of patients eligible for LCS reported that a doctor had recommended screening, compared to 90% of patients reporting a doctor recommended CRCS. Of those recommended screening, 88% reported completing LCS vs. 83% who reported completion of a sigmoidoscopy/colonoscopy. Black patients were equally likely to receive LCS recommendations but less likely to complete LCS when referred compared to White patients. There was no difference in completion of CRCS between Black and White patients. Conclusions: Primary care providers rarely recommend lung cancer screening to patients with a smoking history. Systemic changes are needed to improve provider referral for LCS and to facilitate eligible Black people to complete LCS. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction. While many individuals quit smoking during pregnancy, most relapse within one year postpartum. Research into methods to decrease smoking relapse postpartum has been hampered by difficulties with recruitment. Method. We conducted individual interviews with pregnant women (N = 22) who were interested in quitting smoking while pregnant about their attitudes regarding smoking and quitting during pregnancy, clinical trial participation, and smoking cessation medication use. Results. Participants were aware of the risks of smoking while pregnant. Many wanted to quit smoking before delivery. Few used empirically supported treatments to quit. While research was viewed positively, interest in taking on new commitments postpartum and taking a medication to prevent relapse was low. Medication concerns were evident among most participants, especially among those planning to breastfeed. Further, several women noted medication was unnecessary, as they did not believe they would relapse postpartum. Financial incentives, childcare, and fewer and/or remote visits were identified as facilitators to participating in research. However, these factors did not outweigh women's concerns about medication use and time commitments. Conclusions. Women are aware that quitting smoking during pregnancy and remaining smoke-free postpartum are important. However, beliefs that personal relapse risk is low and that medications are dangerous reduced enthusiasm for taking medication for postpartum relapse prevention. Future medication trials should educate women about the high likelihood of relapse, prepare to answer detailed questions about risks of cessation medications, and connect with participants' clinicians. For new mothers, studies conducted remotely with few scheduled appointments would reduce barriers to participation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Hospitalization offers smokers an opportunity to quit smoking. Starting cessation treatment in hospital is effective, but sustaining treatment after discharge is a challenge. Automated telephone calls with interactive voice response (IVR) technology could support treatment continuance after discharge.Objective: To assess smokers' use of and satisfaction with an IVR-facilitated intervention and to test the relationship between intervention dose and smoking cessation.Design: Analysis of pooled quantitative and qualitative data from the intervention groups of two similar randomized controlled trials with 6-month follow-up.Participants: A total of 878 smokers admitted to three hospitals. All received cessation counseling in hospital and planned to stop smoking after discharge.Intervention: After discharge, participants received free cessation medication and five automated IVR calls over 3 months. Calls delivered messages promoting smoking cessation and medication adherence, offered medication refills, and triaged smokers to additional telephone counseling.Main Measures: Number of IVR calls answered, patient satisfaction, biochemically validated tobacco abstinence 6 months after discharge.Key Results: Participants answered a median of three of five IVR calls; 70% rated the calls as helpful, citing the social support, access to counseling and medication, and reminders to quit as positive factors. Older smokers (OR 1.36, 95% CI 1.20-1.54 per decade) and smokers hospitalized for a smoking-related disease (OR 1.65, 95% CI 1.21-2.23) completed more calls. Smokers who completed more calls had higher quit rates at 6-month follow-up (OR 1.49, 95% CI 1.30-1.70, for each additional call) after multivariable adjustment for age, sex, education, discharge diagnosis, nicotine dependence, duration of medication use, and perceived importance of and confidence in quitting.Conclusions: Automated IVR calls to support smoking cessation after hospital discharge were viewed favorably by patients. Higher IVR utilization was associated with higher odds of tobacco abstinence at 6-month follow-up. IVR technology offers health care systems a potentially scalable means of sustaining tobacco cessation interventions after hospital discharge.Clinical Trial Registration: ClinicalTrials.gov Identifiers NCT01177176, NCT01714323. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Current guidelines advise providers to assess smokers' readiness to quit, then offer cessation therapies to smokers planning to quit and motivational interventions to smokers not planning to quit.Objectives: We examined the relationship between baseline stage of change (SOC), treatment utilization, and smoking cessation to determine whether the effect of a proactive smoking cessation intervention was dependent on smokers' level of motivation to quit.Design: Secondary analysis of a multicenter randomized controlled trial.Participants: A total of 3006 current smokers, aged 18-80 years, at four Veterans Affairs (VA) medical centers.Interventions: Proactive care included proactive outreach (mailed invitation followed by telephone outreach), offer of smoking cessation services (telephone or face-to-face), and access to pharmacotherapy. Usual care participants had access to VA smoking cessation services and state telephone quitlines.Main Measures: Baseline SOC measured with Readiness to Quit Ladder, and 6-month prolonged abstinence self-reported at 1 year.Key Results: At baseline, 35.8 % of smokers were in preparation, 38.2 % in contemplation, and 26.0 % in precontemplation. The overall interaction between SOC and treatment arm was not statistically significant (p = 0.30). Among smokers in preparation, 21.1 % of proactive care participants achieved 6-month prolonged abstinence, compared to 13.1 % of usual care participants (OR, 1.8 [95 % CI, 1.2-2.6]). Similarly, proactive care increased abstinence among smokers in contemplation (11.0 % vs. 6.5 %; OR, 1.8 [95 % CI, 1.1-2.8]). Smokers in precontemplation quit smoking at similar rates (5.3 % vs. 5.6 %; OR, 0.9 [95 % CI, 0.5-1.9]). Within each stage, uptake of smoking cessation treatments increased with higher SOC and with proactive care as compared with usual care.Limitations: Mostly male participants limits generalizability. Randomization was not stratified by SOC.Conclusions: Proactive care increased treatment uptake compared to usual care across all SOC. Proactive care increased smoking cessation among smokers in preparation and contemplation but not in precontemplation. Proactively offering cessation therapies to smokers at all SOC will increase treatment utilization and population-level smoking cessation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Biochemical confirmation (BC) of self-report is the gold standard of evidence for abstinence in smoking cessation research, but difficulty in obtaining samples may bias estimates of quit rates. Proxy confirmation (PC) has not been validated in cessation trials. We assessed the feasibility and validity of PC in a cessation trial for hospitalized smokers.Methods: We enrolled 402 daily cigarette smokers during a hospital admission. At enrollment, participants provided demographics, smoking history, and named proxies to confirm their smoking status at follow-up. Participants provided self-reported (SR) 7-day tobacco abstinence by telephone at 6 months post-discharge. SR quitters were asked to mail a saliva sample for BC. Incentives were offered for survey completion ($20) and returned samples ($50). We called proxies for all those with SR to obtain PC. Quit rates were calculated with missing data indicating smoking. We assessed associations of nonresponse with baseline characteristics using chi-squared tests and logistic regression. We calculated the sensitivity and specificity of PC in detecting smokers as determined by BC.Results: All patients named at least one proxy. Response rates were 82% for SR, 84% for PC, and 69% for BC. Observed participant characteristics were unrelated to provision of sample for BC. Estimated quit rates were 35% for SR, 27% for SR + PC, 21% for SR + BC and 27% for SR + BC or PC. Sensitivity of PC was not higher than SR (73% vs. 77%); specificity was lower (84% vs. 100%).Conclusion: PC was feasible but not superior to self-report in a cessation trial. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]