Current practices and perceived barriers to tobacco-treatment delivery among healthcare professionals from 15 European countries. The EPACTT Plus project

Charis Girvalaki^{1

2}, Enkeleint A Mechili^{2

3}, Sophia Papadakis^{1

2

4

5}, Katerina Nikitara¹, Andrey Demin⁶, Antigona Trofor^{7

8}, Arben Lila⁹, Arusyak Harutyunyan¹⁰, Aurela Saliaj³, Deska Dimitrievska¹¹, Francisco Rodriguez Lozano^{1

12}, George Bakh-Turidze¹³, Javier Ayesta¹⁴, Krzysztof Przewozniak^{15

16}, Maria Sofia Cattaruzza^{17

18}, Marija Zdraveska¹¹, Mihaela Lovše¹⁹, Biljana Kilibarda²⁰, Otto Stoyka²¹, Panagiotis Behrakis^{22

23}, Pierre Bizel²⁴, Polina Starchenko¹, Shkumbin Spahija⁹, Cornel Radu-Loghin¹, Constantine I Vardavas^{1

25}

Affiliations

¹ European Network for Smoking and Tobacco Prevention, Brussels, Belgium.
² Clinic of Social and Family Medicine, Medical School, University of Crete, Heraklion, Greece.
³ Department of Healthcare, Faculty of Health, University of Vlora, Vlore, Albania.
⁴ Division of Prevention and Rehabilitation, University of Ottawa Heart Institute, Ottawa, Canada.
⁵ Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada.
⁶ Institute of Leadership and Healthcare Management, I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Moscow, Russia.
⁷ University of Medicine and Pharmacy 'Grigore T.Popa', Iasi, Romania.
⁸ AER PUR Romania, Bucharest, Romania.
⁹ Kosovo Advocacy and Development Center, Prishtina, Kosovo.
¹⁰ Turpanjian School of Public Health, American University of Armenia, Yerevan, Armenia.
¹¹ Respiratory Society of North Macedonia, Skopje, North Macedonia.
¹² Comité Nacional de Prevención del Tabaquismo, Madrid, Spain.
¹³ Tobacco Control Alliance of Georgia, Tbilisi, Georgia.
¹⁴ University of Cantabria, Cantabria, Spain.
¹⁵ Foundation 'Smart Health - Health in 3D', Warsaw, Poland.
¹⁶ Maria Sklodowska-Curie National Research Institute of Oncology, Warsaw, Poland.
¹⁷ Department of Public Health & Infectious Diseases, Sapienza University, Rome, Italy.
¹⁸ SITAB, Società Italiana di Tabaccologia, Rome, Italy.
¹⁹ Slovenian Coalition for Tobacco Control, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
²⁰ Institute of Public Health of Serbia, Belgrade, Serbia.
²¹ Kyiv Health Center, Kyiv, Ukraine.
²² George D. Behrakis Research Laboratory, Athens, Greece.
²³ Hellenic Cancer Society, Athens, Greece.
²⁴ Wallionie Tabac Prevention, Brussels, Belgium.
²⁵ Medical School, University of Crete, Heraklion, Greece.

PMID: 32548343
PMCID: PMC7291907
DOI: 10.18332/tpc/115033

Case Reports

Current practices and perceived barriers to tobacco-treatment delivery among healthcare professionals from 15 European countries. The EPACTT Plus project

Charis Girvalaki et al. Tob Prev Cessat. 2020.

. 2020 Jan 21:6:6.

doi: 10.18332/tpc/115033. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Affiliations

¹ European Network for Smoking and Tobacco Prevention, Brussels, Belgium.
² Clinic of Social and Family Medicine, Medical School, University of Crete, Heraklion, Greece.
³ Department of Healthcare, Faculty of Health, University of Vlora, Vlore, Albania.
⁴ Division of Prevention and Rehabilitation, University of Ottawa Heart Institute, Ottawa, Canada.
⁵ Faculty of Medicine, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, Canada.
⁶ Institute of Leadership and Healthcare Management, I.M. Sechenov First Moscow State Medical University, Moscow, Russia.
⁷ University of Medicine and Pharmacy 'Grigore T.Popa', Iasi, Romania.
⁸ AER PUR Romania, Bucharest, Romania.
⁹ Kosovo Advocacy and Development Center, Prishtina, Kosovo.
¹⁰ Turpanjian School of Public Health, American University of Armenia, Yerevan, Armenia.
¹¹ Respiratory Society of North Macedonia, Skopje, North Macedonia.
¹² Comité Nacional de Prevención del Tabaquismo, Madrid, Spain.
¹³ Tobacco Control Alliance of Georgia, Tbilisi, Georgia.
¹⁴ University of Cantabria, Cantabria, Spain.
¹⁵ Foundation 'Smart Health - Health in 3D', Warsaw, Poland.
¹⁶ Maria Sklodowska-Curie National Research Institute of Oncology, Warsaw, Poland.
¹⁷ Department of Public Health & Infectious Diseases, Sapienza University, Rome, Italy.
¹⁸ SITAB, Società Italiana di Tabaccologia, Rome, Italy.
¹⁹ Slovenian Coalition for Tobacco Control, Ljubljana, Slovenia.
²⁰ Institute of Public Health of Serbia, Belgrade, Serbia.
²¹ Kyiv Health Center, Kyiv, Ukraine.
²² George D. Behrakis Research Laboratory, Athens, Greece.
²³ Hellenic Cancer Society, Athens, Greece.
²⁴ Wallionie Tabac Prevention, Brussels, Belgium.
²⁵ Medical School, University of Crete, Heraklion, Greece.

PMID: 32548343
PMCID: PMC7291907
DOI: 10.18332/tpc/115033

Abstract

Introduction: The latest evidence-based Guidelines for Treating Tobacco Dependence highlight the significant role of healthcare professionals in supporting smokers interested to quit. This study aimed to identify the current practices of healthcare professionals in Europe and perceived barriers in delivering tobacco treatment to their patients who smoke.

Methods: In the context of EPACTT-Plus, collaborating institutions from 15 countries (Albania, Armenia, Belgium, Italy, France, Georgia, Greece, Kosovo, Romania, North Macedonia, Russia, Serbia, Slovenia, Spain, Ukraine) worked for the development of an accredited eLearning course on Tobacco Treatment Delivery available at http://elearning-ensp.eu/. In total, 444 healthcare professionals from the wider European region successfully completed the course from December 2018 to July 2019. Cross-sectional data were collected online on healthcare professionals' current practices and perceived barriers in introducing tobacco-dependence treatment into their daily clinical life.

Results: At registration, 41.2% of the participants reported having asked their patients if they smoked. Advise to quit smoking was offered by 47.1% of the participants, while 29.5% reported offering assistance to their patients who smoked in order to quit. From the total number of participants, 39.9% regarded the lack of patient compliance as a significant barrier. Other key barriers were lack of: interest from the patients (37.4%), healthcare professionals training (33.1%), community resources to refer patients (31.5%), and adequate time during their everyday clinical life (29.7%).

Conclusions: The identification of current practices and significant barriers is important to build evidence-based guidelines and training programs (online and/or live) that will improve the performance of healthcare professionals in offering tobacco-dependence treatment for their patients who smoke.

Keywords: Europe; barriers; current practices; eLearning; healthcare professionals; tobacco-dependence treatment.

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Conflict of interest statement

The authors have completed and submitted the ICMJE Form for Disclosure of Potential Conflicts of Interest and none was reported.

References

1. World Health Organization . WHO Report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic: The MPOWER Package. Geneva, Switzerland: World Health Organization; 2008. https://www.who.int/tobacco/mpower/2008/en/. Accessed September 22, 2019.
1. European Network for Smoking and Tobacco Prevention . 2018 Guidelines for Treating Tobacco Dependence. 4th ed. Brussels, Belgium: European Publishing; 2018. http://elearning-ensp.eu/pluginfile.php/1052/mod_resource/content/2/guid.... Accessed September 22, 2019.
1. Mechili EA, Girvalaki C, Saliaj A, et al. WHO FCTC Article 14 enforcement in Albania: An urgent issue to tackle. Tob Prev Cessation. 2019;5(February):1–4. doi: 10.18332/tpc/103126. - DOI - PMC - PubMed
1. Fiore MC, Jaén CR, Baker TB, et al. Treating tobacco use and dependence: 2008 update. Rockville, MD: US Department of Health and Human Services; 2008.
1. Girvalaki C, Papadakis S, Vardavas C, et al. Training General Practitioners in Evidence-Based Tobacco Treatment: An Evaluation of the Tobacco Treatment Training Network in Crete (TiTAN-Crete) Intervention. Health Educ Behav. 2018;45(6):888–897. doi: 10.1177/1090198118775481. - DOI - PubMed

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Current practices and perceived barriers to tobacco-treatment delivery among healthcare professionals from 15 European countries. The EPACTT Plus project

Affiliations

Current practices and perceived barriers to tobacco-treatment delivery among healthcare professionals from 15 European countries. The EPACTT Plus project

Authors

Affiliations

Abstract

Conflict of interest statement

References

Publication types

LinkOut - more resources

Full Text Sources