Eliminating Nicotine Dependence (END)

Dental Patient Wellness Curriculum
Dental practitioners are a largely untapped resource for providing advice and brief counseling to patients who use tobacco. Although the hazards associated with smoking and smokeless tobacco are well known, the adoption of tobacco cessation into dental practice has been slow. If dental practitioners provided cessation assistance routinely and achieved even modest success rates, the public health impact would be enormous. In recent years, the number of dental schools that recommend students discuss tobacco cessation with their patients has increased, yet implementation of tobacco cessation education in the pre-doctoral curriculum is inconsistent and non-systematic. Research conducted at Baylor College of Dentistry to evaluate the effects of integration of tobacco cessation in pre-doctoral dental education showed a significant impact on factors that have a positive effect on tobacco intervention and prevention. At present, the tobacco cessation curriculum at the three dental schools in Texas provide some tobacco intervention although the curricula are inconsistent, some topics are not included and the burden of delivery of the material is typically the responsibility of a single faculty member. The intent of the proposed project is to use a multi-component intervention to enhance tobacco cessation education and practice in Texas dental schools.