National Working Group for ACTTION

Jul 01, 2010
Letter from Diane Canova

Dear Partners,

As you can see from the masthead at the top of this newsletter, we have given ourselves a facelift! We at Partnership for Prevention have for some months been considering a new look for our website and newsletter, so we enlisted the help of a design firm.  As a result, ActionToQuit – Advancing Tobacco Cessation Policy will be our new identity and the old “ACTTION” will be discontinued. If you visit the ActionToQuit website (www.actiontoquit.org) you’ll see the new logo. From now on we will be using the new logo and revised identity. This publication will be referred to as the ActionToQuit Monthly Newsletter and its recipients the ActionToQuit Network.

Jul 01, 2010
ActionToQuit Grantees Moving Forward—Florida

The six ActionToQuit State Grantees have begun working on their year-long projects to implement innovative strategies to increase access to tobacco cessation treatments.  Each month the newsletter will feature an interview a different grantee to share information about their projects.  The first interview is with Florida.

Jul 01, 2010
CMS Proposes Medicare Coverage for Counseling to Prevent Tobacco Use

In a proposed decision memo the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) has concluded that “the evidence is adequate to conclude that counseling to prevent tobacco use, which is recommended with a grade of A by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF) for all adults and pregnant women who use tobacco, is reasonable and necessary for prevention of illness or disability and is appropriate for individuals entitled to benefits under Part A or enrolled under Part B.”

Jul 01, 2010
Interview with Donna Warner and Caroline Cranos of the Multi-State Collaborative

The Multi-State Collaborative for Health Systems Change is a network of 20 state-level tobacco control programs and national partner organizations whose mission is to facilitate sustainable changes in health care policy at the state and national level in order to increase cessation rates and reduce tobacco use prevalence. ActionToQuit recently asked Donna Warner and Caroline Cranos to tell us more about this exciting undertaking.

Jul 01, 2010
Around the States

• Oregon Health Insurance Plans Must Cover Cessation
• More Michigan Smokers Calling Quit Line
• Iowa to End Free Nicotine Replacement Products
• Kentucky Medicaid Cessation Program Gets $1.5 Million
• N.J. Advocates Seek to Keep Anti-tobacco Programs in Budget
• Cigarette Makers and Retailers Sue to Block New York City Rule Requiring Antismoking Posters

Jul 01, 2010
Decline in Wisconsin Smoking Rates Linked with Cessation Outreach Program

Smoking rates in Wisconsin have fallen by almost 20 percent since 2000. In 2000, the University of Wisconsin Center for Tobacco Research and Intervention (UW-CTRI) launched the Wisconsin Cessation Outreach Program – a population-wide effort to increase the availability and use of evidence-based clinical treatment for tobacco dependence. The Outreach program is funded by the Wisconsin Department of Health Services.

Jul 01, 2010
Referring Emergency Room Visitors to Quitlines

A program using pre-health professional students as Research Associates (RAs) in hospital emergency rooms can be effective in screening large numbers of patients and visitors in the emergency department for compliance with a wide variety of primary health care recommendations, including smoking cessation.

Jul 01, 2010
Statistical Snapshots

• In Selected Diagnoses, Most Hospital Patients Receive Cessation Advice
• Higher Participation Needed in Employer-Sponsored Smoking Cessation Programs

Jul 01, 2010
An EX Update—for Anglers

Legacy’s EX campaign, a free internet resource using evidence-based information to guide smokers to useful resources that help with successful quit attempts, was described in the February 2010 newsletter.  EX touches all kinds of people in all kinds of situations. There is a feature on ESPN about two experienced fishermen who have qualified for the Bassmaster Classic over 25 times and were smokers.  They are struggling, on camera, to re-learn life - and fishing - without cigarettes with the help of EX.

There are no key dates for this briefing.