Wednesday 11th March 2026 was National No Smoking Day, we used this day to highlight the work that one of our Gloucestershire Primary Care Networks (PCN) is taking to support their patients in their own stop smoking journey.
Gloucestershire’s Inner City Primary Care Networks’ Stop Smoking Service supports a range of patients to stop smoking via their ‘Health and Well Being Coach/Stop Smoking Advisor’.
Why was the service established? Gloucestershire PCN’s ‘Stop Smoking’ Service started in September 2023 in response to a service evaluation conducted as part of a larger respiratory quality improvement project. The evaluation showed that:
23% of the PCN population smoked and 35% of respiratory patients smoked
Approximately 42% of the practice population are eastern European (mainly Polish)
In response to this, the PCN appointed a Polish ‘Stop Smoking Advisor’ who can also communicate in Czech and Slovak (and English)
How are patients referred?
“Some patients come to the Stop Smoking advisor directly through referrals from other clinicians. The PCN also use their respiratory risk stratification tool proactively to search for respiratory patients who smoke (i.e. amber asthma patients who smoke, who are at risk of developing COPD).
What support do you provide? Part of the Stop Smoking Advisors work is to support the PCN in addressing health inequalities – They phone patients who speak Polish/Slovak/Czech who wouldn’t normally access health care services (because of a language barrier). But more important than any NRT (Nicotine Replacement Therapies) products or medication for stopping smoking is behavioural support, which includes encouragement and rapport.
Benefits to date
oDuring the project (15 months), there were 135 quit attempts, with 44 CO verified quits (CO = Carbon Monoxide readings), a 36% success rate
oA Patient survey showed that:
•92% of patients were seen in person
•95% would recommend the service to family and friends
•96% felt very supported
oThe PCN saw a significant % reduction in consumption across all dependency smokers (If quit was not achieved)
oBusiness Intelligence usage data showed a 22.3% reduction in outpatient appointments 10.3 % reduction in ED attendance and 7.5% reduction in GP contacts after having seen the Health and Wellbeing Coach/Stop Smoking Advisor
oThe service continues to support Polish / Slovak and Czech speaking patients, as well as any respiratory patients who smoke. This year, we are focusing on ‘rising risk’ asthma patient who smoke in view of preventing disease progression to COPD.
For any tips on stopping smoking, please see – Quit smoking – Better Health – NHS