The 13th World Conference on Tobacco OR Health

Objective: To understand participants' satisfaction for National Smoking Cessation Service in Taiwan.

Methods: 1,791 subjects were randomly selected from those who received NSCS with cessation counseling and treatment in Feb 2004. Telephone-conducted questionnaire survey, including 10 items to research participants' satisfaction in different aspects, was done 6 months after first physician visit. Each item could be scored from 0-very unsatisfied to 10-very satisfied.

Results: 550 subjects(30.7%) successfully completed questionnaire bty telephone in Aug 2004. The male/female ratio was 466/84 with a mean age of 46.0±15.2 years. They have smoked for 22.5±13.7 years and 25.1±11.8 cigarettes per day. The mean FTQ (scored 0-11) was 7.0±2.1. The point abstinence rate was 24.7% (136/550) 6 months after treatment. Four items had average scores greater than 8, including service accessibility (mean score: 8.52), health professionals' attitude (8.43), instruction for medicine use (8.33) and physician counseling (8.25). The satisfaction scores were slightly lower for health education (7.73) and office waiting time (7.81). Regarding to the adjuvant therapy for tobacco cessation, our subjects' feedback basically disclosed disappointment. Their acceptability of medication (nicotine gum or patch) was 6.90, and perceived effectiveness of medication 6.61. The score for the item “Is smoking cessation treatment helpful?” was only 6.38. The overall satisfaction for to NSCS was 7.62. NRT has been well recognized as an effective adjuvants for smoking cessation in clinical trials. However, its acceptability and perceived effectiveness was relatively low in our survey.