Smokers' Quitline for Asian Language Speakers

Summary

The study tested the effects of telephone counseling for smokers from three Asian language speaking groups: Chinese, Korean, and Vietnamese. The specific aims were to: 1) test the efficacy of a culturally appropriate counseling protocol for smokers calling the California Smokers' Helpline on the Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese lines, 2) examine whether intervention effects varied by cognitive and behavioral predictors of cessation success, 4) examine whether family involvement plays a role in quitting success, and 5) assess differences in counseling effect across the three ethnic groups.

Conditions

• Smoking Cessation

Interventions

BEHAVIORAL

Telephone Counseling

Counseling is conducted in Mandarin, Cantonese, Korean, or Vietnamese by counselors at the Helpline. The protocol used is similar to that proved efficacious. However, to make the counseling culturally appropriate for Asian language speakers, we: capitalizing on first contact, present the Helpline as a credible quit smoking program staffed by "experts", avoid the term "counseling" since it is associated with mental illness, and assume a more authoritative role and directive counseling style. Counseling is proactive (1st call is made by smoker, then subsequent calls are made by the counselor) to help reduce attrition. Counseling includes a 30-40 minute comprehensive pre-quit session plus up to 5 shorter follow-up calls (about 10 minutes) scheduled according to the probability of relapse.

BEHAVIORAL

Self-Help Materials

All subjects (both in the telephone counseling group and the materials-only group) receive self-help materials in teh appropriate language. Materials were created in-house, are written in the appropriate language, and cover the essentials of the quitting process such as motivation, physiological and emotional responses to quitting, nicotine in the body, quitting aids, quitting strategies (including those that might be culturally specific such as acupuncture or herbs), setting a quit date, planning, relapse prevention, differentiating between slips and relapse, long-term maintenance, and developing the nonsmoker self-image.

Sponsors & Collaborators

• National Cancer Institute (NCI)

  collaborator NIH

• University of California, San Diego

  lead OTHER

Principal Investigators

• Shu-Hong Zhu, Ph.D. · University of California, San Diego

Study Design

Allocation

RANDOMIZED

Purpose

TREATMENT

Masking

NONE

Model

PARALLEL

Eligibility

Min Age

18 Years

Max Age

75 Years

Sex

ALL

Healthy Volunteers

No

Timeline & Regulatory

Start

2004-08-31

Primary Completion

2008-04-30

Completion

2008-11-30

Countries

• United States

Study Locations