Cessation Materials for Tobacco Control Programs
The Office on Smoking and Health (OSH) works with tobacco control programs to develop, conduct, and support strategic efforts to protect the public’s health from the harmful effects of tobacco use. Helping people quit using tobacco can reduce the disease, death, and immense cost caused by tobacco use.1 The featured materials below are links to cessation references and resources designed to help inform tobacco control programs and assist with tobacco cessation interventions and implementation
Cessation Materials
- Best Practices for Comprehensive Tobacco Control Programs—2014: Cessation Interventions [PDF – 496KB]
A document that focuses on cessation interventions as a core component of state tobacco control programs. - Best Practices User Guide: Cessation—2020
Addresses how to implement health systems change, increase insurance coverage for cessation treatment and support state quitlines. - Clinical Practice Guideline: Treating Tobacco Use and Dependence: 2008 Update
Effective clinical treatments for tobacco dependence that have become available since the 2000 Guideline was published.- Treating Tobacco Use and Dependence: 2008 Update—Overview
Evidence tables and recommendations contained in the clinical practice guideline.
- Treating Tobacco Use and Dependence: 2008 Update—Overview
- U.S. Prevention Services Task Force 2021 Recommendation Statement on Tobacco Smoking Cessation in Adults, Including Pregnant Persons: Interventions
The U.S. Preventive Services Task Force recommendation statement provides updated recommendations for primary care providers on effective tobacco cessation treatment for adults. - Community Preventive Services Task Force: Task Force Findings for Tobacco
The Guide to Community Preventive Services is a collection of evidence-based findings for interventions that improve health and prevent disease.
Overarching Resources
- Coverage for Tobacco Use Cessation Treatments (updated October 2020)
This document provides an overview of the evidence base for tobacco cessation insurance coverage, best practices for designing cessation coverage, and the current status of cessation coverage. - May 2014 FAQ Guidance on Cessation Coverage
This subregulatory guidance, issued by the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor, and Treasury in May 2014 as an FAQ, clarifies what the Affordable Care Act provision requiring that nongrandfathered private plans cover evidence-based preventive services means for tobacco cessation coverage (see Question 5).
Working with Medicaid: Overarching Resources
- Medicaid
Medicaid enrollment numbers and information on policies and programs. - State Medicaid coverage for tobacco cessation treatments and barriers to accessing treatments – United States, 2008-2018.
Medicaid coverage for tobacco cessation treatments and barriers to accessing treatments by state for 2008 and 2018. - STATE System Medicaid coverage of tobacco cessation treatments fact sheet
Map and table of current state Medicaid coverage. - Medicaid.gov Policies in Practice Feature on Tobacco Cessation
A Medicaid.gov feature on Medicaid support for tobacco cessation activities by state Medicaid programs.
Working with Medicaid: Resources from the 6|18 initiative
- The 6|18 Initiative: Accelerating Evidence into Action | CDC
CDC is partnering with health care purchasers, payers, and providers to improve health and control health care costs including a focus on reducing tobacco use. - Reduce Tobacco Use – Implementing CDC’s 6|18 Initiative: A Resource Center (chcs.org) Center for Health Care Strategies, Inc.
A compendium of implementation resources that can help payers, state officials, and providers to implement high-opportunity tobacco reduction interventions. Click on the Benefits and Coverage section on the lower left of the page.
Working with Medicaid: State Examples
- Reduce Tobacco Use – Implementing CDC’s 6|18 Initiative: A Resource Center (chcs.org). Center for Health Care Strategies, Inc.
A collection of state examples of implementing media campaigns on cessation coverage, cessation policies and programs, and related surveys and evaluations. Click on the State Examples section on the lower left of the page. - Case Study: The Effect of Expanding Cessation Coverage—The Massachusetts Medicaid Cessation Benefit [PDF – 286KB]
A case study of the implementation and outcomes of the 2006 Massachusetts Medicaid cessation coverage benefit. - Medicaid Tobacco Cessation Coverage in Oklahoma: A Case Study in Leveraging Systems and Partnerships [PDF – 2MB]
Summary of a consortium developed through a CDC-funded cooperative agreement to provide technical assistance to state tobacco control programs and national and state tobacco control organizations on tobacco cessation approaches. - A Framework for Effective Promotion of a Medicaid Tobacco Cessation Benefit
This case study describes how Vermont made its Medicaid cessation coverage and cessation services more accessible and vigorously promoted these improvements to Medicaid enrollees and health care providers using a range of approaches. This effort led to increased use of cessation services (including the state quitline) by Medicaid enrollees and increased cessation support from health care providers to this population.
Overarching Health Systems Change for Tobacco Cessation Resources
- Best Practices User Guide: Cessation
Addresses how to implement health systems change, increase insurance coverage for cessation treatment and support state quitlines. See section titled, Promoting Health Systems Change (pages 11-19). - Million Hearts®Tobacco Cessation Change Package
Tobacco Cessation Change Package Tutorial Video – YouTube
This Million Hearts® quality improvement resource contains actionable ideas and useful resources to help health systems and practices increase the reach and effectiveness of tobacco cessation interventions.
Clinical Implementation Resources
- A Practical Guide to Help Your Patients Quit Using Tobacco [PDF – 646KB]
A four-page overview on how to deliver a brief clinical intervention for tobacco cessation. - Million Hearts®Protocol for Identifying and Treating Patients Who Use Tobacco [PDF – 633KB]
Million Hearts® Guide: Identifying and Treating Patients Who Use Tobacco: Action Steps for Clinicians [PDF – 339KB]
These two companion Million Hearts® tools contain practical information, action steps, and health system design considerations to enable health care providers to intervene effectively to help patients who use tobacco quit. - The brief tobacco intervention: quick reference for health care providers [PDF – 70KB]. DHHS.
A two-page overview on how to deliver the “2 A’s and R” brief tobacco intervention (Ask, Advise and Refer) and the 5 A’s brief tobacco intervention (Ask, Advice, Assess, Assist, and Arrange). - Healthcare Provider Resources
Background information, guidance, and quit smoking resources for health care providers.
State Surveys of Health Plans
- Sample Managed Care Organization Survey Questions to Assess Smoking Prevalence and Available Cessation Benefit. Center for Health Care Strategies and CDC. Technical Assistance Tool. June 2018.
This tool provides sample questions from surveys used by Medicaid and public health programs to gather information about tobacco cessation benefits from MCOs.
- National Network of Tobacco Cessation Quitlines 15th Anniversary Infographic [PDF – 2MB]
This infographic gives a visual timeline of the evolution of state quitlines from 2004 through 2019. - National Quitline Data Warehouse (NQDW)
The NQDW collects data on callers to state quitlines including both 1-800-QUIT NOW and the state quitline numbers. - North American Quitline Consortium Quitline Map
The North American Quitline Consortium’s Quitline Map contains in-depth information on the hours of operation, telephone and online services, medications, eligibility, and referral programs of state quitlines.
- USPSTF Recommendation: Prevention and Cessation of Tobacco Use in Children and Adolescents: Primary Care Interventions
The USPSTF recommends that primary care clinicians provide interventions, including education or brief counseling, to prevent initiation of tobacco use among school-aged children and adolescents.
The USPSTF concludes that the current evidence is insufficient to assess the balance of benefits and harms of primary care–feasible interventions for the cessation of tobacco use among school-aged children and adolescents.
- PHS Guideline Recommendations: How to Help Adolescents Quit Smoking [PDF – 608KB]
Recommendations that adolescent smokers be provided with counseling interventions to aid them in quitting smoking.
- Best Practices User Guide: Health Equity in Tobacco Control and Prevention [5.04 MB]. CDC. 2015.
This user guide offers information on how to identify gaps in health equity and work toward achieving health equity in tobacco control when planning, implementing, and enforcing policies, programs, and interventions. - Networking2Save: CDC’s National Network Approach to Preventing and Controlling Tobacco-related Cancers in Special Populations. CDC.
Consortium of national organizations to advance the prevention of commercial tobacco use and cancer in populations experiencing tobacco- and cancer-related health disparities. - National Cancer Institute. Monograph 22: A Socioecological Approach to Addressing Tobacco-Related Health Disparities [PDF – 12MB]. 2017. page 482.
A comprehensive report summarizing research on tobacco-related health disparities from the perspectives of epidemiology, individual behavior, biology, cultural context, and societal structures. - Smoking Cessation: A Surgeon General’s Report. Chapter 2. 2020.
Summary of data on key disparities in cessation among adults. - Tobacco Use and Quitting Among Individuals With Behavioral Health Conditions
Information and resources to encourage and assist with cessation among people with behavioral health conditions. - Promising Policies and Practices to Address Tobacco Use by Persons with Mental and Substance Use Disorders
State examples of policies and programs to encourage and assist with cessation among people with mental and substance abuse disorders. - Tobacco-Related Disparities
Information on disparities in cessation across groups defined by race, ethnicity, educational level, and socioeconomic status and across regions of the country. - Tips from Former Smokers: Specific Groups
Information on how smoking and secondhand smoke affect specific groups, as well as smoking-related statistics, information, and quitting resources.
- Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Best Practices for Comprehensive Tobacco Control Programs—2014. Atlanta, GA: US Dept of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health; 2014