Help Employees Quit
Helping tobacco users quit not only saves lives – it also saved everyone money. These savings come from lower healthcare costs, increased workplace productivity and prevented premature deaths.The real costs of smoking are staggering:
- Cigarette smoking is responsible for more than 480,000 deaths per year.1
- Smoking-related illness in the U.S. costs more than $300 billion a year, including over $225 billion in direct medical care for adults and $156 billion in lost productivity.2
The Affordable Care Act requires employers and health insurance plans to cover preventive services at no cost to insurance plan members. Tobacco cessation treatment is a preventive service required under this law for more health plans. The American Lung Association's tobacco cessation program, Freedom From Smoking®, can fulfill this requirement, and has over 41 years of experience helping hundreds of thousands of individuals become tobacco-free.
Contact the American Lung Association to discuss tobacco cessation program options with our proven Freedom From Smoking® program by calling 1-800-LUNGUSA or emailing us at [email protected].
Freedom From Smoking® Modalities
The American Lung Association's highly effective smoking cessation program is used by employers, hospitals, health plans and other organizations to help the individuals they serve become tobacco-free for life.
There's a Freedom From Smoking® option for every person and every setting. No other cessation program offers the same range of options and solutions.
All Freedom From Smoking® options include FREE access to our online support community, FreedomFromSmoking.Inspire.com. Individuals can log on and discuss their challenges and success stories with others working to break their tobacco addiction.
Freedom From Smoking® Plus
Quit tobacco use with the click of a button through the Freedom From Smoking® Plus, the online 12-month membership program. A user-friendly interface helps you create a personal quit plan on your desktop, tablet or smartphone. Through interactive features that include videos, quizzes and activities, Freedom From Smoking® Plus (FFS Plus) walks you through the quitting process and offers a surround sound of support from quitters through our online community.
Freedom From Smoking® Plus is the perfect fit for community members, patients, members, multi-unit housing residents, corporations, wellness programs, schools, colleges, and universities as it:
For a brief overview, visit: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S_S1jTL5A90&t=99s
One-on-One Counseling
Freedom From Smoking® Quitline is available through the Lung HelpLine. Proven tobacco cessation approach used seamlessly by employers of all sizes to reduce absenteeism, increase productivity, and manage employee healthcare costs. Based on addiction and behavior change models, the program addresses the difficulties of quitting in a sensitive, supportive style.
Freedom From Smoking® Onsite or Virtual Group Programs
Freedom From Smoking® group programs offer personalized attention and peer support in a small in-person setting for up to 16 employees at a time. The clinic format encourages participants to work on the process and problems of quitting both individually and as part of a group.
- Small in-person or virtual on-line group setting (up to 16 employees) offers personalized attention and peer support.
- Eight session program over seven-weeks gives participants time to prepare to quit and practice being tobacco-free in a supportive environment
- Led by facilitators trained by the American Lung Association
- Participant workbooks and relaxation exercises available in English or Spanish
- Enables individuals to ask specific questions as they prepare to quit tobacco
The group program can be implemented by sending a representative from your workplace to be trained as a Freedom From Smoking® Facilitator to host onsite or virtually delivered group programs. Facilitator Training registration is $400 per person being certified.
For more information view the Become a Facilitator page here.
Since it was first introduced more than 41 years ago, the American Lung Association's Freedom From Smoking® program has helped over one million Americans end their addiction to nicotine and begin new tobacco-free lives. Freedom From Smoking® is based on proven addiction and behavior change models (including the Social Cognitive Theory, Transtheoretical Model and Motivational Interviewing). The program offers a structured, systematic approach to quitting, and its positive messaging emphasizes the benefits of better health.
Self Help Resource
The Freedom From Smoking®: The Guide to Help You Quit Smoking is an interactive manual that addresses the difficulties of quitting with real-life advice, helpful activities and innovative graphic approach.
- At-home tobacco cessation manual can be used independently or can supplement any of the options
- Winner – 2015 National Health Information Awards
To purchase your own copy of the Freedom From Smoking®: The Guide to Help You Quit Smoking, visit Lung.org/PrintStore and order the guide in Spanish here, or in English here. Contact the American Lung Association at 1-800-LUNGUSA or [email protected] to see how we can incorporate Freedom From Smoking® into your organization.
How to Provide a Comprehensive Tobacco Cessation Benefit
The American Lung Association urges all employers to make sure their health insurance includes a comprehensive tobacco cessation benefit for all employees. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) requires employee-sponsored health insurance to cover tobacco cessation, but we recommend a model benefit that goes beyond the ACA requirement and gives tobacco users the best chance to become tobacco-free. A cessation benefit should:
- Cover all treatments recommended in the U.S. Public Health Service Guideline, include all seven medications on plan formularies and preferred drug lists, and cover all three forms of counseling.
- Cover each medication for its FDA-approved duration of use. Cover at least four counseling sessions per quit attempt, and at least two quit attempts per year—more is even better.
- Eliminate or reduce co-pays and other cost-sharing on medications and counseling.
- Do not require prior authorization of treatments, which slows down treatment and can decrease an individual’s motivation and momentum to quit.
- Do not limit the number of times a person can try to quit in their lifetime. Quitting is a process that usually takes many attempts.
- Do not require stepped-care therapy, which can force a patient to use a treatment they have already tried or that is not right.
- Do not require patients to attend counseling to obtain medications. Counseling should be encouraged but requiring it may discourage some people from seeking any assistance with quitting.
Workplace Tobacco Cessation Interest Form
References
- U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. The Health Consequences of Smoking—50 Years of Progress: A Report of the Surgeon General. Atlanta: U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Office on Smoking and Health, 2014 [accessed 2018 Feb 22]
- Xu X, Shrestha SS, Trivers KF, Neff L, Armour BS, King BA. U.S. Healthcare Spending Attributable to Cigarette Smoking in 2014. Preventive Medicine. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.ypmed.2021.106529