Action Planning as a Strategy to Increase Smoking Cessation Care: Explorative Study Among General Practitioners

Abstract

Background To explore if action planning improves the uptake of guidelines for smoking cessation care by general practitioners (GPs). Methods During a training GPs (n=25) formulated action plans on asking about smoking and advising to quit and coping plans for encountering smokers who are (un)motivated to quit. GPs’ plans were rated on the degree of specificity and GP-reported goal attainment. Patients reported smoking cessation activities of GPs after consultation during a three-week period prior (n=1002) and following (n=630) the training. Findings We found an effect of high GP plan specificity (OR 1.52, 95% CI 1.29-1.92) and high GP goal attainment (OR 2.83, 95% CI 2.18-3.68) on the number of patients being asked about smoking compared to baseline. Patients were most likely to be asked about smoking when GPs formulated a highly specific plan ánd reported a high goal attainment (OR 3.35, 95% CI 2.50-4.47). No effects were found on other smoking cessation activities. Discussion Incorporating action planning in a training for GPs may improve the frequency at which smokers are identified, especially when GPs describe their plan highly specific.