Tobacco use is responsible for more than 430,000 deaths each year and is the largest cause of preventable morbidity and mortality in the United States (CDC) 
.
It is recognized as a cause of:
- Multiple cancers
- Heart disease
- Stroke
- Complications of pregnancy
- Chronic obstructive pulmonary disease
Community Guide Recommendations
Reducing tobacco use initiation
These interventions seek to reduce the number of people who begin using tobacco products.
Increasing the unit price of tobacco products
These interventions increase the unit price for tobacco products through municipal, state, or federal legislation that raises the excise tax on these products. Such increases make the use of tobacco products less attractive to young people who have limited incomes and a variety of ways to spend their money.
Mass media campaigns when combined with other interventions
Mass media campaigns intended to reduce tobacco initiation use brief, recurring messages to inform and motivate individuals to remain tobacco free. Message content is developed through formative research, and messages may be delivered through paid broadcast time and print space, donated time and space (as public service announcements), or a combination of both. Mass media campaigns can be combined with other interventions.
Increasing tobacco use cessation
These interventions are designed to increase the number of people who stop using tobacco. Approaches range from providing support to people who are trying to quit to increasing the cost of tobacco products.
Increasing the unit price of tobacco products
These interventions increase the unit price for tobacco products through municipal, state, or federal legislation that raises the excise tax on these products. Such increases make the use of tobacco products less attractive to young people who have limited incomes and a variety of ways to spend their money.
Mass media campaigns when combined with other interventions
Mass media campaigns intended to reduce tobacco initiation use brief, recurring messages to inform and motivate individuals to remain tobacco free. Message content is developed through formative research, and messages may be delivered through paid broadcast time and print space, donated time and space (as public service announcements), or a combination of both. Mass media campaigns can be combined with other interventions.
Mobile phone-based interventions
Mobile phone-based cessation interventions use interactive features to deliver evidence-based information, strategies, and behavioral support directly to tobacco users interested in quitting. Typically, participants receive text messages that support their quit attempt, and the message content changes over the course of the intervention.
Content may be developed or adapted for specific populations and communities. Messages may be tailored for individuals based on computer algorithms that match messages to information provided by the participant. Programs may be automated, and they may include text responses provided on demand to participants encountering urges to smoke.
Mobile phone-based interventions may be coordinated with additional interventions, such as Internet-based cessation services or provision of medications.
Provider reminders when used alone
Provider reminder systems for tobacco cessation include efforts to identify clients who use tobacco products and to prompt providers to discuss and/or to advise clients about quitting. Providers may receive these reminders through chart stickers, vital sign stamps, medical record flow sheets, and checklists. Provider reminders are often combined with other approaches.
Provider reminders with provider education
Provider reminder systems with provider education are multicomponent strategies to increase tobacco use cessation. These strategies include efforts to educate and to prompt providers to identify and intervene with tobacco-using clients, as well as to provide additional educational materials. The components of this intervention are a provider reminder system and a provider education program with or without client education materials such as self-help cessation manuals.
Reducing client out-of-pocket costs for cessation therapies
These interventions include efforts to reduce the financial barriers that may keep people from using cessation therapies such as nicotine replacement, other pharmacologic therapies, or behavioral therapies including cessation groups. Services may be provided through the healthcare system or clients may be reimbursed for their expenses.
Multicomponent interventions that include telephone support
These multicomponent interventions provide people who use tobacco products with cessation counseling or assistance in initiating or maintaining abstinence via telephone. Telephone support can be reactive (tobacco user initiates contact) or proactive (provider initiates contact or user initiates contact with provider follow-up). Telephone support includes the use of trained counselors, health care providers, or taped messages in single or multiple sessions. Sessions usually follow a standardized protocol for providing advice and counseling, and the telephone support component is usually combined with other interventions, such as client education materials, individual or group cessation counseling, or nicotine-replacement therapies.
Reducing exposure to environmental tobacco smoke
These interventions seek to reduce exposure to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS), which is a preventable cause of significant illness and death.
Smoking bans and restrictions
Smoking bans and restrictions are policies, regulations, and laws that limit smoking in workplaces and other public areas. Smoking bans entirely prohibit smoking in geographically defined areas; smoking restrictions limit smoking to designated areas.
Restricting minors’ access to tobacco products
These interventions seek to prevent or reduce the number of young people who begin smoking by making it harder for them to purchase tobacco products.
Community mobilization with additional interventions
These are community-wide interventions aimed at focusing public attention on the issue of youth access to tobacco products and mobilizing community support for additional efforts to reduce that access.
Decreasing tobacco use among workers
These interventions seek to reduce tobacco use among employees through organizational policies and smoking cessation programs.
Smoke-free policies to reduce tobacco use
Smoke-free policies include private-sector rules and public-sector regulations that prohibit smoking in indoor workplaces and designated public areas. Private-sector smoke-free policies may establish a complete ban on tobacco use on worksite property or restrict smoking to designated outdoor locations. Community smoke-free ordinances establish smoke-free standards for all or for designated indoor workplaces and public areas.
Incentives & competitions to increase smoking cessation when combined with additional interventions
Worksite-based incentives and competitions to reduce tobacco use among workers offer rewards to individual workers and to teams as a motivation to participate in a cessation program or effort.
- Rewards can be provided for participation, for success in achieving a specified behavior change, or for both.
- Types of rewards may include guaranteed financial payments, lottery chances for monetary or other prizes, and return of self-imposed payroll withholdings.
Welcome to Thrive SEK’s Blog
Thrive SEK is launching this blog to keep you informed about health-related news and activities in our region. At the bottom of most pages on this website, you will see the blog entries that are relevant to the topics on that page. The goal of Thrive Southeast Kansas is to encourage healthy lifestyles in our area. This website blog is just one tool that we will use to accomplish that goal. We are in the process of adding new information and features to the website, so check back regularly for updates. If you have suggestions for information to...
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