A systematic review of tobacco smoking cessation services in Africa: Practices and challenges faced by healthcare workers

Abstract

Background: Tobacco smoking is a global public health challenge, resulting in an estimated loss of 1.4 trillion United States Dollars (USD), a preventable risk that can be achieved through tobacco cessation services. The study, therefore, aimed to review the most frequently used methods employed by healthcare workers (HCWs) in providing tobacco cessation services and reported challenges in Africa.
 Methods: A systematic review was conducted using five electronic databases (PubMed, Base, PsychInfo, Google Scholar, and African Journal Online) for published studies on HCW’s practices and challenges on tobacco cessation in Africa. We adopted a three-stage methodology to conduct the study, which identified articles using pre-defined key terms, screened articles to remove duplicates, and excluded irrelevant articles after reading the manuscripts’ titles and abstracts.
 Results: We reviewed articles and found that 35.0% to 83.0% of HCWs frequently asked their patients to quit smoking. Also, 14.9% of HCWs assisted smoking cessation among their patients, among whom 3.9% prescribed oral depressants and 2.8% prescribed Nicotine Replacement Therapy (NRT). Further, 17.0% of HCWs had guidelines to help patients to cease smoking. Challenges were lack of efficacy and training, lack of system support, low sense of responsibility by some physicians to incorporate the smoking cessation therapy to their patients, lack of attractive educational resources on smoking cessation, limited knowledge on effective intervention strategies, lack of guidelines, lack of specialists for smoking cessation, and unavailability of NRT.
 Conclusion: Follow-up should be commenced and intensified by HCWs for smoking cessation among tobacco smokers.

Global Status of Knowledge, Attitude and Practice on Tobacco Cessation Interventions Among Dental Professionals: A Systematic Review

“…Only ten studies 22,29,35,37,43,49,51,59,68,66 reported the dental professionals were in the practice of prescribing NRT, which is very low and efforts must be undertaken to educate the dental professionals on NRT and pharmacotherapy as well. The most common barriers in providing tobacco cessation counseling as enlisted by the studies were time, 16, 22,26,29,32,33,37,39,41,42,44,48,50,52,53,58,59,61,67,70,66,68,71 followed by training, 18,22,28-32,35,37,39,44,48,52,53,59,66,68,71 and this similar finding was reported in a study conducted among African healthcare workers as well 12…”

“…8 Healthcare professionals must be informed of behavioral as well as pharmacotherapy related measures for tobacco cessation. 9 Previous systematic reviews have been conducted which have assessed either attitude 10 or practice 11,12 among different healthcare workforce such as nurses, 11 dental professionals, 10 medical professionals, 13 healthcare workers. 12 Rationale and aim of the study: With this systematic review, we aim to address the lacunae of compiled data regarding knowledge, attitude and practice among dental professionals globally.…”

“…9 Previous systematic reviews have been conducted which have assessed either attitude 10 or practice 11,12 among different healthcare workforce such as nurses, 11 dental professionals, 10 medical professionals, 13 healthcare workers. 12 Rationale and aim of the study: With this systematic review, we aim to address the lacunae of compiled data regarding knowledge, attitude and practice among dental professionals globally. Therefore, the aim of this systematic review is to determine the global status of knowledge, attitude and practice regarding tobacco cessation intervention among dental healthcare professionals.…”

“…Healthcare professionals must be informed of behavioral as well as pharmacotherapy related measures for tobacco cessation. 9 Previous systematic reviews have been conducted which have assessed either attitude 10 or practice 11 , 12 among different healthcare workforce such as nurses, 11 dental professionals, 10 medical professionals, 13 healthcare workers. 12 …”

“…9 Previous systematic reviews have been conducted which have assessed either attitude 10 or practice 11 , 12 among different healthcare workforce such as nurses, 11 dental professionals, 10 medical professionals, 13 healthcare workers. 12 …”