Butting In: Evaluating the Effectiveness of Nurse Practitioner-Provided Smoking Cessation Education in Cardiovascular Patients

Abstract
The adverse health outcomes related to smoking are well established, yet many
cardiovascular patients continue to smoke. The current standard of care for smoking cessation
education is health care provider (HCP) counseling of patients. This intervention proves to be
most effective on smoking cessation rates if performed frequently as one part of a multi-pronged
approach. Smoking cessation is particularly important in the cardiovascular population as the
associated disease processes are often exacerbated by the pathophysiological effects of smoking.
Therefore, it is imperative to examine and measure the success rate of a nurse-practitioner (NP)
managed smoking cessation education program in the outpatient cardiovascular setting. A multi
modal smoking cessation education program taking place for a period of one month included the
use of video modules, follow-up counseling, education related to nicotine-replacement therapy
(NRT), and support resources by an NP. At the completion of the program, available data
supports the NP directed approach of integrating multi-modal smoking cessation education for
the cardiovascular patient population in the outpatient setting. The patients who eliminated or
reduced smoking for the one- month program period reported that the NP counseling in
conjunction with video availability contributed to their success.