Health Care Services Accreditation ... Utilisation of Quitline Services. 1. ... Alexandra Hospital, Brisbane in 2012 showed that only 33% of smokers are prescribed ...
Guiding Patients and Staff down the Smoking Cessation Clinical Pathway Deepali Gupta 1,2,3, L Hayson1,4, B East1,5, K. Barrow1,6, M Winning7, V Goldup7, K Grudzinskas8 , L. Loy9
Issue
Objective
• Smoking is a significant health and financial issue resulting in $64 Million in healthcare costs to Queensland and $31 Billion to Australian Government annually. o Stricter Legislations and smoke-free health care are some proven measures to reduce the burden of this disease. Hospitalisation not only provide an opportunity to initiate brief or intensive interventions in smokers, it also enforces acute Nicotine withdrawal in inpatients requiring acute treatment. • A disconnect between the smoking assessment and care planning for inpatients is evident: o A Drug Use Evaluation snapshot auidit of Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT) conducted at Princess Alexandra Hospital, Brisbane in 2012 showed that only 33% of smokers are prescribed NRT in the hospital, and 9% are prescribed NRT at discharge (Data on file). o A Pragmatic Randomised Controlled Trial conducted in same facility in 2013 evaluated the utilisation of hospital-pharmacist initiated intervention in prescription of NRT. Results showed that only 24% of patients in the usual care were prescribed NRT (Publication in press). o Smoking cessation clinical pathway is available since 2012 but the uptake and utilisation was poor due to lack of an implementation strategy. 2013 Randomised Controlled Trial
In 2015, Metro South Hospitals and Health Service commenced the implementation of a comprehensive multifaceted multidisciplinary strategy that encompassed patient assessment and care planning using smoking-cessation clinical pathway, staff education, cessation of smoking within the health service boundaries and increased availability of Nicotine Replacement Therapies (NRT) within all patient care areas.
