The Public Health Foundation (PHF) has partnered with the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to promote
Winnable Battles, public health priorities with large-scale impact on health and with known, effective strategies to address them.
Tobacco use, an identified Winnable Battle, is a major preventable cause of premature death and disease worldwide. In the United States, an estimated 46.6 million people currently smoke and an estimated 443,000 people die prematurely each year from diseases caused by smoking or secondhand exposure – resulting in billions of dollars in healthcare costs annually.
Using evidence-based, scalable interventions such as those recommended in
The Guide to Community Preventive Services (The Community Guide) assist health departments, community-based organizations, and others to make significant progress in reducing tobacco use. Whidbey General Hospital (WGH) in collaboration with the Washington State Department of Health, Island County Health Department, and the Tobacco Cessation Resource Center uses
The Community Guide to decrease tobacco use throughout the community.
Since 2004, WGH has been receiving support from its state and local health departments and others to offer free tobacco cessation classes to in-patients and community groups. To identify patients who use tobacco, nurses administer short surveys. Once tobacco users are identified, nurses offer free classes or other free resources from the Washington State Quitline, the American Lung Association, the American Cancer Society, the American Heart Association, or the National Quitnet as interventions. If patients complete all four 90-minute classes, WGH and the WGH Cancer Care Committee provide free vouchers for Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT) patches or gum for two weeks to participants, which
reduces out-of-pocket participant costs. These efforts also ensure that the appropriate psychosocial tools are offered, which helps to improve outcomes with the therapy.
"Because we are a rural population with varied needs, our challenge is to reach as many people as possible. Everything we do involves a teamwork approach. By using a collaborative approach and having the local hospital as the hub, we have been able to reach a larger group. Anyone who wishes to widen their outreach to include hospital patient populations, workplace populations, or the broader community to improve tobacco cessation outcomes, could implement similar processes specific to their population needs."
Do you have a success story in implementing evidence-based strategies outlined in
The Community Guide to improve health outcomes in tobacco or other areas? Learn more about PHF’s
2013 “I’m Your Community Guide!” Contest for information on how you can share your story.