Smoke-free leave for patients in a mental health hospital
Research type
Research Study
Full title
Maintaining abstinence from smoking during authorised periods of leave in a smoke-free mental health hospital
IRAS ID
223407
Contact name
Leonie Brose
Contact email
Sponsor organisation
King's College London
Duration of Study in the UK
1 years, 0 months, 0 days
Research summary
Smoking remains the most important preventable cause of cancer in the UK and the largest cause of death, disease and health inequalities. Smoking prevalence has declined in the general population from over 50% to now under 20%. This improvement has excluded those with mental health problems where smoking prevalence is twice as high and increases with severity of illness, reaching 80% in those hospitalised for psychiatric treatment. As one of the first mental healthcare trusts, South London and the Maudsley (SLaM) went completely smoke-free, which means that service users are only allowed to smoke when they are able and allowed to leave the hospital grounds. This provides an opportunity for service users to stop smoking and improve their health. However, breaking the addiction is difficult and most smokers smoke as soon as they have an opportunity to smoke. One critical point is when service users first are allowed to leave the hospital grounds for a short time. Our aim is to see if it is feasible to provide additional support to help in-patients in a mental health hospital remain abstinent from smoking during times when they are allowed to leave the hospital site. We believe this will improve their chances of staying smoke-free longer-term. We will deliver some extra support to inpatients who were smoking before their stay and are initially on a smoke-free ward without leave. This support will include additional nicotine-containing products for the short-term leave and non-monetary rewards for abstinence. We will then follow these service users up for a few months to check their carbon monoxide levels (a marker for smoking), ask about their smoking, their opinion of the additional support provided and what else would have been helpful. Additionally, we will ask staff about what would help them to support patients to remain smoke-free.
REC name
Yorkshire & The Humber - Bradford Leeds Research Ethics Committee
REC reference
17/YH/0274
Date of REC Opinion
4 Aug 2017
REC opinion
Favourable Opinion