Smoking Cessation Program

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Introduction

Cigarette smoking has for a long period of time been the cause of thousands of deaths either directly or indirectly because of the complications that arise from smoking. Thus from statistics cigarette smoking has become a proven killer (Carmody et al. 2008). However, if it doesn’t lead to death it most often leads to detrimental effects to the wellbeing and health of the smoker. However, quitting smoking is not an easy task but its rewards are plenty. Moreover, due to the benefits associated with quitting smoking it is usually highly advisable to quit cigarette smoking and open up to a healthy and happy life. This has led to the initiation of various smoking cessation programs which helps people who are interested in quitting smoking.

The chosen program which is smoking cessation is mostly aimed at ensuring that the persons enrolled into it ceases cigarette smoking either through individually  assisted intervention or as a group (Hutter, Moshammer & Neuberger, 2006).  However, the cessation of smoking may occur with or without the assistance of healthcare professionals and medications, but mostly a collaborative approach is usually taken towards the program. The program was chosen because it is undoubtedly one of the most beneficial health care delivery programs. It is also very cost effective because of the health benefits associated with it. This is due to the fact that ceasing cigarette smoking results to a wide array of health benefits as well as increasing life expectancy (Prochaska et al. 1993). At the same time it tremendously reduces life threatening diseases that are associated with smoking such cancer thereby drastically reducing medical costs. Due to the advantages associated with the program I was then convinced to select it for evaluation.

Goals and objectives of the program

Presently the program does not yet have well outlined goals and objectives but this is expected to be solved within a short period of time.  The absence of the goals and objectives at this time is attributable to the fact that the program is still at proposal stage and it is a community based one meaning that there is need to lay down the logistical issue first. However, I have evaluated several goals and objectives which might be very effective for this program.

The four main objectives identified for this program involves achieving 100% cigarette smoking quitting among those enrolled for the program. The other objective is actually to reduce the number of smokers within the community. In addition, the other two objectives are ensuring provision of both material and social support to those willing to quit smoking as well as reducing the number of people who start smoking within the community.

The above identified objectives will undoubtedly have numerous roles towards the success of this program. For instance, the full achievement of these goals will lead to the actualization of the dream of the program initiators which is to drastically reduce the number of people smoking. For example, considering the first goal of the program which is to achieve 100% quitting of the smoking among those enrolled indicates that there will be no defaulters leading to a large number of people ceasing smoking (Prochaska et al. 1993).

However, the second objective which is reducing number of smokers within the community will likely be achieved depending on the success of the first one. This is because if the number of defaulters in the program then there will be a high number of ex-smokers in the community thereby drastically reducing the cigarette smoking population. Moreover, providing both material and social support will be an effective intervention to the people who finds it hard to stop smoking meaning medications will be required in combination to counselling (Carmody et al. 2008). Finally, the program will also involve an aggressive campaign towards ensuring that there are no new smokers in the community. This will be carried out through sensitization of the people about the harmful effects of smoking. The role of this objective will thus be to discourage smoking within the community.

Steps and phases of program planning and evaluation

There are several steps that will be put in place in order to ensure that there is effective planning and evaluation of the program. For instance, the first phase of the program will involve enrolment of the target smokers who will be willingly picked from the community upon their consent. The second phase of the program will involve the rehabilitation process consisting of  group counselling as well as medication using nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) to those who will have difficultly in quitting (Carmody et al. 2008). This will then be followed by close monitoring and evaluation of the success of smoking cessation among the participants. This will take 4 to 6 weeks for every new batch in for the program to be successful.

Stakeholders’ roles

Several stakeholders in this program will need to play different roles for the successful conclusion of the program. However, the involved stakeholders will involve the community based organisations (CBO), health care professionals, the program manager, hospitals and the participants. The CBO will help in identifying potential candidates for the program. The health care professionals and hospital will be involved in providing the necessary medical services and medications whenever required while the program manager will help in liaising all the program stakeholders and activities.

Data tracking

The data obtained from the program will be closely tracked by the use of a computer database which will be used to closely monitor the data collected from the program stakeholders and participants.

References

Carmody, T.P, Duncan, C., Simon, J.A. et al. (2008). Hypnosis for smoking cessation: a       randomized trial. Nicotine Tob Res, 10 (5): 811–8.

Hutter, H., Moshammer, H. & Neuberger, M. (2006). Smoking cessation at the workplace: 1 year success of short seminars. Int Arch Occup Environ Health, 79 (1): 42–8.

Prochaska, J.O., DiClemente, C.C., Velicer, W.F. et al. (1993). Standardized, individualized, interactive, and personalized self-help programs for smoking cessation. Health Psychology, 12 (5): 399–405.