Smoking Cessation: Clinical Intervention (Out of Print)

Abstract This resource is a web-based instructional curriculum to teach medical students different approaches to counseling for smoking cessation and prevention, including tobacco control strategies and techniques designed for use in the clinical setting. The curriculum offers several features that take advantage of web-based technology, such as layered instructional material, videotaped scenarios, and interactivity. The resource, based on the US Public Health Service Clinical Guideline for Treating Tobacco Use and Dependence, is divided into two parts: the tutorial and practicum sections. An evaluation of the resource was conducted at the Morehouse School of Medicine and Mercer University School of Medicine; pre- and postexposure measures were collected for the evaluation. The mean differences for correctly answered knowledge items in the two schools were similar, indicating improvements in knowledge at both schools. There were statistically significant improvements in all categories of self-rated ability to perform six counseling skills, except for Mercer students for the “Ask” skill category. The amount of exposure was not related to overall change in scores but was associated with self-reported improvement in skill in assisting patients to quit smoking, confidence in counseling patients not interested in quitting, and confidence in counseling teens. Overall, this web-based curriculum successfully improved the students' self-rated counseling skills. Given the need and desire for training on the part of practitioners, the curriculum may be found useful by practicing physicians and other health care professionals who wish to improve their skills in smoking prevention and cessation