Financial incentives and ethnic disparities in smoking cessation interventions

Financial incentives may help improve the delivery of smoking cessation interventions in primary care. However, UK have generally not examined the impact of financial incentives on disparities in the delivery of smoking cessation interventions. In a paper published recently in the Journal of Public Health, Fiona Hamilton and colleagues examined associations between disease group [cardiovascular disease (CVD), respiratory disease, depression or none of these diseases], ethnicity and smoking outcomes following the introduction of the Quality and Outcomes Framework in 2004. They found that significantly, more CVD patients had smoking status ascertained compared with those with respiratory disease (89% versus 72%), but both groups received similar levels of cessation advice (93% and 89%). Patients with depression or none of the diseases were less likely to have smoking status ascertained (60% for both groups) or to receive advice (80 and 75%). Smoking prevalence was high, especially for patients with depression (44%). White British patients had higher rates of smoking than most ethnic groups, but black Caribbean men with depression
had the highest smoking prevalence (62%). They concluded that extending financial incentives to include recording of quit rates by ethnic group may further improve smoking cessation outcomes in primary care.

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