Smoking Cessation Services

The latest issue of the Journal of Public Health includes a systematic review of strategies to enhance access of disadvantaged groups to smoking cessation programmes that makes quite bleak reading. The team of researchers considered 48 studies, around half from the UK, but found few that provided clear evidence of success, partly owing to a lack of reporting of socioeconomic data. However, the authors do note that NHS stop smoking services have managed to reach smokers living in disadvantaged areas. They also identify good practice, such as the use of "health equity audits" to interrogate client data and ensure that services are reaching disadvantaged groups. Meanwhile the Department of Health has announced a "new systems-based approach", modelled on the process used by stop smoking services in Yorkshire and Humberside.