TobaccoFreeNurses - Leadership

The first-ever summit of nursing organizations focusing on tobacco control occurred on March 25-26, 2004 at the Agency for Health Care Policy and Research in Gaithersburg, Maryland.

Purpose of the summit

This initiative was funded by a $174,000 grant from the University of California, San Francisco, Smoking Cessation Leadership Center to Dr. Linda Sarna at the UCLA School of Nursing. This historic event convened 21 leading nursing organizations that comprise the national nursing leadership task force on tobacco control to

provide information and resources on tobacco control issues and how they intersect with nursing,
develop shared goals for nurses’ efforts in tobacco control, and
prepare individual organizational action plans that each task force member will initiate on behalf of his/her organization in one of the following three areas: (1) increasing the proportion of nurses who assist patients to quit; (2) decreasing the prevalence of tobacco use among nurses, and (3) increasing nursing organizations’ involvement in tobacco control policy efforts.

Information and resources on tobacco control issues and how they intersect with nursing

Experts in the fields of nursing and tobacco control shared information and provided resources on tobacco control issues, and showcased how nurses have been involved in tobacco control efforts. Please see the attached summit agenda (Appendix A) and handouts from presentations for content from these presentations.

Shared goals for nurses’ efforts in tobacco control

Based on information shared at the summit and a visioning exercise in which all attendees participated (see Appendix B for a list of task force members), the participants set targets for nursing in the three topical areas of the summit: increasing the proportion of nurses who assist patients in quitting, decreasing the proportion of nurses who smoke, and increasing involvement of nursing organizations in tobacco control policy efforts.

During the summit, participants reviewed baseline information and set targets for where they want nursing to be in 2 and 5 years.

Targets for the percent of nurses who will conduct the “5 As” with their patients:

	Now	2 year target	5 year target
Ask	64%	75%	100%
Assess	38%	50%	75%
Advise	32%	50%	75%
Assist	34%	50%	75%
Arrange/Refer	5-8%	20%	40%

Targets for smoking prevalence of nurses (in percents):

	Now	2 year target	5 year target
LPNs	30%	National average	<20%
RNs	16%	12%	<10%

Targets for the percent of nursing organizations on the task force that will engage in tobacco control policy efforts:

Now	2 year target	5 year target
48%	75%	100%

Develop action plans for each organization

Participants were divided into working groups to focus on one of the three topical and target areas for the summit. Each participant then developed individual organizational action plans and identified at least one activity their organization could accomplish in 4 months (end of year 1 of project) and within 1 year. The following are some of the major activities planned.

Making it an organizational priority to help nurses to assist their patients to quit smoking. The in-coming president of the Philippine Nurses Association of America (PNAA) stated in the summit that she plans to make smoking cessation a major component of her strategic plan. The Student Nurses Association likewise plans to make smoking cessation an organizational priority.
Instructing nurses how to assist their patients to quit using tobacco. Through continuing education efforts, train-the-trainers, and electronic communications, a number of organizations committed themselves to teaching their membership how to assist in smoking cessation efforts.
Promoting cessation for nurses—A number of organizations plan to promote the Tobacco Free Nurses website, QuitNet for Nurses, and related resources among their membership. They will disseminate this information through conference presentations, member newsletters, organizational websites, and nursing journals.
Passing position statements in support of tobacco control. One of the activities that most organizations proposed is to pass a position statement and/or white paper on tobacco control issues. Since many organizations need to have formal policy in order to work on issues, this is an appropriate step. Several organizations voiced support for endorsing an international code of practice statement on health professional organizations and tobacco control.

On-going communication strategy for task force

Participants at the summit identified a number of different strategies for ongoing communication and activity for the task force. A tab for the Leadership Task Force will be put on the Tobacco Free Nurses website (www.tobaccofreenurses.org), with the potential for a list serve or chat room being developed either on the Tobacco Free Nurses website or a Yahoo group. Participants were particularly interested in learning about success stories in a periodic e-newsletter. Participating in periodic, focused, conference calls was also discussed.

Conclusion/next steps

This historic event brought together the leading national nursing organizations to discuss and set goals about tobacco control for nurses and nursing organizations. We want to harness the energy and enthusiasm that was created at the meeting to increase the proportion of nurses who assist their patients in quitting tobacco use, increase the proportion of nurses who quit smoking, and increase the number of nursing organizations involved in tobacco control policy efforts. To this end, the following activities will be conducted over the next few months:

Next steps include: