Tobacco counseling at well-child and tobacco-influenced illness visits: opportunities for improvement

Screening and counseling associated with obesity diagnosis in a national survey of ambulatory pediatric visits

OBJECTIVE

To examine clinician-reported diagnosis of obesity and frequency of blood pressure assessment and diet and exercise counseling during ambulatory visits made by children and adolescents.

METHODS

The National Ambulatory Medical Care Survey and National Hospital Ambulatory Medical Care Survey 1997 to 2000 were combined for visits to clinicians of 2- to 18-year-olds. Well-child visits (WCVs) were examined for frequencies of obesity diagnosis, blood pressure screening, and diet and exercise counseling in relation to patient and clinician characteristics. Multivariate models examined the relationship of patient and visit characteristics with diet and exercise counseling.

RESULTS

Of the 32 930 ambulatory visits made by 2- to 18-year-olds in 1997-2000, obesity was diagnosed at 0.78% of all visits and 0.93% of WCVs. Blood pressure assessment was reported in 61.1% of WCVs with obesity diagnosis compared with 43.9% of WCVs without obesity diagnosis. WCVs with obesity diagnosis had higher diet counseling rates (88.4% vs 35.7%) and higher exercise counseling rates (69.2% vs 18.6%). Diet counseling was reported for 88.4% and exercise counseling was reported for 69.2% of visits with an obesity diagnosis compared with 35.7% and 18.6% during WCVs without a diagnosis of obesity. In multivariate analyses, factors associated with diet counseling at WCVs were diagnosis of obesity (odds ratio [OR]: 12.9; 95% confidence interval [CI]: 3.0-55.3), being seen by pediatricians (OR: 2.5; 95% CI: 1.6-3.9), 2- to 5-year-olds compared with 12- to 18-year-olds (OR: 0.7; 95% CI: 0.5-1.0), and self-pay compared with private insurance visits (OR: 0.6; 95% CI: 0.4-0.9). Associations with exercise counseling were similar to those for diet counseling, but exercise counseling occurred less frequently in visits by black youths compared with white youths (OR: 0.5; 95% CI: 0.3-0.8).

CONCLUSIONS

Clinicians may overlook obesity during WCVs. Programs to increase obesity diagnosis could improve diet and exercise counseling rates, but even with diagnosis of obesity, significant opportunities for screening and intervention are missed.

The primary care pediatrician's influence on medical student's performance of smoking assessments and counseling

BACKGROUND

American medical schools lack significant educational programs for teaching medical students about counseling parents and children on smoking prevention and cessation. Thus, the objectives of this study were to describe medical student's self-reported behaviors in the assessment of parents and children's use of tobacco and to compare these practices with well-accepted pediatric activities: injury prevention and developmental assessment.

METHODS

Third year medical students in a pediatric clerkship at Boston University, all of whom spend part of their clerkship with pediatricians in their offices, completed six weekly surveys (2001-2002) recording their clinical activities in counseling parents and children about smoking, injury prevention, and performing developmental assessments.

RESULTS

Of the 150 third year students completing the pediatric orientation, 108 (72%) completed all six feedback surveys and the general cancer prevention survey. Of the 108 students, 77% completed smoking assessments with at least one family per week during their 6-week clerkship compared with performance of injury prevention (85%, P = 0.09) and developmental assessment (91%, P = 0.006). Among all smoking cessation and prevention recommendations, students were most likely to discourage parents from smoking in the house and least likely to offer tips for parents to counsel their children about smoking. All variables related to primary care pediatricians' role modeling and feedback for optimal tobacco counseling practices were significantly associated with student counseling practice.

CONCLUSIONS

Third year medical students were less likely to complete smoking assessments than those for developmental assessment and injury prevention counseling. However, primary care pediatricians' strong expectations and modeling of smoking counseling were uniformly associated with improved self-perceived student performance. Future educational activities should engage the primary care pediatrician preceptors of students completing pediatric rotations.

State-of-the-art interventions for office-based parental tobacco control

Parental tobacco use is a serious health issue for all family members. Child health care clinicians are in a unique and important position to address parental smoking because of the regular, multiple contacts with parents and the harmful health consequences to their patients. This article synthesizes the current evidence-based interventions for treatment of adults and applies them to the problem of addressing parental smoking in the context of the child health care setting. Brief interventions are effective, and complementary strategies such as quitlines will improve the chances of parental smoking cessation. Adopting the 5 A's framework strategy (ask, advise, assess, assist, and arrange) gives each parent the maximum chance of quitting. Within this framework, specific recommendations are made for child health care settings and clinicians. Ongoing research will help determine how best to implement parental smoking-cessation strategies more widely in a variety of child health care settings.

Physician and dentist tobacco use counseling and adolescent smoking behavior: results from the 2000 National Youth Tobacco Survey

OBJECTIVE

The present study describes patterns of tobacco use counseling among physicians and dentists as reported by adolescents and determines the association between provider advice to quit and cessation activities among current smokers.

METHODS

Data were analyzed from the 2000 National Youth Tobacco Survey, an anonymous, self-administered, school-based survey. The National Youth Tobacco Survey was administered to a nationally representative sample of 35828 students in grades 6 to 12 in 324 schools.

RESULTS

Thirty-three percent of adolescents who visited a physician or a dentist in the past year reported that a physician counseled them about the dangers of tobacco use, and 20% reported that a dentist provided a similar message. Among students who smoked in the past year, 16.4% received advice to quit from a physician and 11.6% received advice to quit from a dentist. Physician or dentist advice to quit was correlated with 1 or more quit attempts in the past 12 months.

CONCLUSION

On the basis of adolescent reports, physician and dentist practice patterns remain well below recommended guidelines. Results suggest that provider advice to quit is associated with cessation activity. Additional studies are needed to confirm whether the low prevalence of brief provider tobacco use counseling is a missed opportunity to affect adolescent smoking behavior.

Addressing parental smoking in pediatrics and family practice: a national survey of parents

BACKGROUND

Parental smoking has been associated with increased rates of sudden infant death syndrome, low birth weight, otitis media, asthma, and decreased lung growth. No prior parent surveys have assessed national rates of screening and counseling for parental tobacco use in the context of their child's visit to primary care.

OBJECTIVE

To assess and compare rates of pediatrician and family practitioner screening and counseling for parental smoking. Design/Methods. Data were collected by telephone survey of households from July to September 2001. The sample is weighted by race and gender based on 1999 US Census estimates to be representative of the US population.

RESULTS

Of 3566 eligible respondents contacted, 3002 (84%) completed surveys; 902 of those were parents who had a child seen by a pediatrician (62%) or family practitioner (38%) in the past year. About half of all parents who visited a pediatrician or family practitioner reported that they had been asked about household member smoking status (52% vs 48%). More parents who visited pediatricians had been asked if they had rules prohibiting smoking in the home than those who visited family practitioners (38% vs 29%). Of 190 (21%) parents who were smokers, fewer than half reported being counseled by either specialty about dangers of second-hand smoke (41% vs 33%) or risks of modeling smoking behavior (31% vs 28%). Similarly, fewer than half of parental smokers received advice to quit (36% vs 45%).

CONCLUSION

Overall rates of screening and counseling for parental smoking in pediatric and family practice are low. Despite some differences between specialties, significant opportunities exist to improve tobacco control activities in primary care settings that serve children.

The state of office-based interventions for youth tobacco use

Tobacco use is a serious pediatric health issue as dependence begins during childhood or adolescence in the majority of tobacco users. Primary care settings provide tremendous opportunities for delivering tobacco treatment to young tobacco users. Although evidence-based practice guidelines for treating nicotine dependence in youths are not yet available, professional organizations and the current clinical practice guideline for adults provide recommendations based on expert opinion. This article reports on the current tobacco treatment practices of pediatric and family practice clinicians, discusses similarities and differences between adolescent and adult tobacco use, summarizes research efforts to date and current cutting-edge research that may ultimately help to inform and guide clinicians, and presents existing recommendations regarding treating tobacco use in youths. Finally, recommendations are made for the primary care clinician, professional organizations, and health care systems and policies. Pediatricians and other clinicians can and should play an important role in treating tobacco dependence in youths.