Three years since its initial SAMHSA leadership academy gathering, Pennsylvania asked SCLC to help reconvene partners to reboot cessation efforts with the behavioral health community.

Pennsylvania became the first state to have a two-day state summit on Zoom. Led by facilitator, Raj Chawla of The OCL Group, 62 participants representing diverse sectors reviewed data and reaffirmed the baselines and targets set in 2017.

Highlights included an advocate’s personal story of becoming tobacco free and state leaders pledging their support to the group.

Three strategy work groups were established as the foci of the revised action plan: Systems Integration, Stakeholder Education and Training and Data. Each work group outlined its commitments, objectives, contributors, process measures, and timelines on an action template, which will be updated regularly to include achievements and challenges. Below are the affirmed baselines and targets.TB

One year after Indiana’s Strategic Planning Summit, stakeholders from tobacco control, behavioral health, public health, cancer control, managed care, primary care, and advocacy reconvened to assess their progress to date.

SCLC and its NBHN partners will continue to offer assistance and guidance to the State Leadership Academies.

Want to learn more about becoming a State Leadership Academy for Tobacco-Free Recovery? Contact [email protected] for information. 

Alaska’s Copper River Native Association (CRNA) goes smoke-free, keeping their promise to provide “exceptional” healthcare to their community. Watch Paul Rude, CEO of CRNA, tell the story of the four-year journey to become a smoke-free campus and the smokers on staff who were some of the strongest advocates. Click here to see the video and other great resources.

Last month, SAMHSA Center of Excellence for Tobacco-Free Recovery and the National Behavioral Health Network hosted two virtual Tobacco-Free Recovery trainings in collaboration with the Alaska Leadership Academy and Illinois American Lung Association. The trainings brought in 667 participants (304 on Aug. 6 and 363 on Aug. 12) from across the nation. Responses show 96% of participants were pleased with the quality of the trainings. One participant said it “confirmed a lot of what we are doing already and helped to bring to the forefront how the social determinants of health and trauma affect tobacco use and treatment.” Another said it was, “the most organized and professional training I've attended through this COVID-19 crisis…thank you for your attention to details, organization, and all the extra resources.”

SCLC’s webinar series continues on Wednesday, Oct. 7 from 2-3pm ET with “Integrating Tobacco Treatment within the Stanford Cancer Center: An NCI Moonshot Initiative.” Jodi Prochaska, PhD, MPH, and her research team at Stanford University will discuss the need for tobacco treatment integration within cancer care and examine evidence for engaging and supporting patients in treatment and tobacco-free living. Attendees will also learn workflow processes to build efficiencies in identifying patient tobacco use and recognize the value of training models in meeting educational and clinical goals. 

Our last webinar drew more than 975 registrants to hear Dr. Brenna VanFrank, Senior Medical Officer at CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health (OSH) speak on “Systems Change: Increasing Treatment for Tobacco Dependence in Behavioral Health.” If you missed it, click here to access the slides and hear the recording.

Fall Back-To-School Webinar Promotion - Earn up to 18.0 CME/CEUs for free! As a SAMHSA Center of Excellence, the SCLC is excited to offer FREE continuing education units (CEUs) for our Back to School Webinar Series. We are providing two collections of recorded webinars with up to 18.0 FREE CME/CEUs available to all eligible providers! Topics include engaging health professionals around cessation, state and community approaches to tobacco control, quitlines, behavioral health, smoke-free public housing, smokeless tobacco, online interventions for cessation, pharmacotherapy, tobacco harm reduction, veterans and tobacco, health systems change for tobacco cessation, e-cigs and vaping, FDA regulations and non-daily smokers.

Want to make it easier for your organization to help smokers quit? SCLC has developed a plastic “Quit Card” the size of a credit card to help promote the national quitline—and we are now offering them for free! Eighty-five percent of groups who purchased it found that the card helped streamline their organization’s ability to provide tobacco cessation assistance to patients, and 80% said it has increased the number of patients in their organization who receive advice on quitting. Health professionals, counselors, and peers have distributed more than 4 million QUIT NOW cards.  

NIH Funding Opportunities

The National Cancer Institute at the National Institutes of Health (NIH) has two new Funding Opportunity Announcements (FOA). This funding will support observational or intervention research focused on reducing disparities in tobacco use and secondhand smoke exposure in the U.S. Specifically, the funding aims to stimulate scientific inquiry focused on innovative state and local tobacco prevention and control policies. The long-term goal of the funding is to reduce disparities in tobacco-related cancers, and in doing so, to promote health equity among all populations. Applications for each opportunity are due November 12, 2020.