Preparing for Completely Smoke-Free Mental Health Settings: Findings on Patient Smoking, Resources Spent Facilitating Smoking Breaks, and the Role of Smoking in Reported Incidents from a Large Mental Health Trust in England

Harpreet Sohal, Lisa Huddlestone and Elena Ratschen
Additional contact information
Harpreet Sohal: UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies, Division of Epidemiology & Public Health, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG5 1PB, UK
Lisa Huddlestone: UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies, Division of Epidemiology & Public Health, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG5 1PB, UK
Elena Ratschen: UK Centre for Tobacco and Alcohol Studies, Division of Epidemiology & Public Health, University of Nottingham, Nottingham NG5 1PB, UK

IJERPH, 2016, vol. 13, issue 3, 1-12

Abstract: Introduction : Despite high smoking prevalence and excessive smoking-related morbidity and mortality among people with mental disorder compared to the general population, smoking treatment is often neglected in mental health settings. The UK National Institute of Health and Clinical Excellence (NICE) recently issued public health guidance stipulating completely smoke-free mental health settings. This project evaluated existing smoking-related practices in preparation for guidance implementation. The objectives were to: audit the recording of smoking-related information and treatment provision; explore current arrangements relating to the facilitation of patient smoking; measure staff time spent and identify costs of facilitating smoking; and explore the role of smoking in smoking-related incidents. Methods : A mixed-methods study was conducted across four acute adult mental health wards, accommodating 16 patients each, over six months. It included a case-note audit, on-site observations, and a qualitative content analysis of incident reports. Results : Smoking status was recorded for less than half of the 290 patients admitted (138, 48%). Of those, 98 (71%) were recorded as current smokers, of whom 72 (74%) had received brief smoking cessation advice. Staff spent 6028 h facilitating smoking, representing an annual cost of £131,040 across four wards. Incident reports demonstrated that smoking facilitation was often central to the cause of incidences, triggered frustration in patients, and strained staff resources . Conclusion : The findings highlight the importance and potential of implementing completely smoke-free policies using comprehensive pathways.

Keywords: smoking; mental health; mental disorder; tobacco dependence; psychiatric settings; NICE PH48; smoking cessation; nicotine dependence; smoke-free policy (search for similar items in EconPapers)
JEL-codes: I I1 I3 Q Q5 (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2016
References: View references in EconPapers View complete reference list from CitEc
Citations:

Downloads: (external link)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/13/3/256/pdf (application/pdf)
https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/13/3/256/ (text/html)

Related works:
This item may be available elsewhere in EconPapers: Search for items with the same title.

Export reference: BibTeX RIS (EndNote, ProCite, RefMan) HTML/Text

Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:13:y:2016:i:3:p:256-:d:64464

Access Statistics for this article

IJERPH is currently edited by Ms. Jenna Liu

More articles in IJERPH from MDPI
Bibliographic data for series maintained by MDPI Indexing Manager ().