The 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health

Objective: Brief counseling plus pharmacotherapy may not be the most appropriate population-level approach for helping smokers to quit. Matching smokers to different treatments through triage has the potential to balance the effectiveness, reach and cost of treatments. The study compared the reliability of three modes of self administration of a validated triage tool compared to administration by a trained interviewer.

Methods: Participants were recruited using random digit-dialing techniques in two regions of Canada. Current adult smokers, able to read, write, speak, and understand English, and with access to the Internet were eligible to participate. Participants completed the triage tool via a trained interviewer over the phone and were randomized to complete one of the three self-administration modes (i.e. pen and paper, web-based, or automated telephone) within 2-10 days (N=406). Trained and self administrations were counterbalanced across participants.

Results: Smokers were able to reliably self-administer the tool in each of the 3 modes: pen and paper [% agreement= 77.5%, k=0.68 (0.59-0.77)], phone [% agreement=81.7%, k=0.73 (0.64-0.82)], and web [% agreement=89.9%, k=0.84 (0.75-0.93)] compared to trained administration. Further analyses examined which factors predicted successful self-administration by mode.

Implications: Smokers are able to reliably self-administer the triage tool. Service providers may consider such forms of self-administration to deliver population-level smoking cessation interventions in a cost-effective manner.