Smoking Cessation for Fathers of Sick Children
mHealth-based Motivational Counselling Integrate With a Sample of Nicotine Replacement Therapy for Fathers of Sick Children Who Smoke Cigarettes: A Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial
The University of Hong Kong
160 participants
Mar 18, 2025
INTERVENTIONAL
Conditions
Summary
The project aims to develop and examine the feasibility, acceptability, and preliminary effectiveness of a proactive intervention model combined brief advice, nicotine replacement therapy sampling and mHealth-based individual counselling in increasing smoking abstinence for fathers of sick children.
Eligibility
Inclusion Criteria6
- Parents (mainly fathers) aged ≥18 years and smoke at least one cigarette (including alternative tobacco products) daily in the past seven days
- Living with a child aged \<18 years who attended the clinic or were admitted to the pediatric ward
- Hong Kong residents able to read and communicate in Cantonese or Putonghua
- Children aged \<18 years who attended the clinic or were admitted to the pediatric ward
- Lives with at least one or more parents who smoke at least one cigarette (including alternative tobacco products) daily in the past seven days
- Able to provide biochemical samples (e.g. saliva) for purpose of research
Exclusion Criteria4
- Smokers having a history of psychiatric/psychological disease or currently on regular psychotropic medications
- Children who already have serious health diseases (e.g.chronic disease, genetic disease)
- Children who are participating in other clinical trials that may affect the results of this study
- Children who live in certain environments, such as those living in highly contaminated areas or areas with other potential disease-causing factors
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Interventions
Participants will be advised to choose the NRT according to their preferences and daily cigarette consumption. Cigarette consumption of ≤20 daily will receive the 14mg patch or 2mg gum and participants consume \>20 cigarettes daily will receive the 21mg patch. An NRT use card (Appendix 6 draft) containing the instructions and potential side effects were given with a brief oral explanation. Full course of pharmacological treatment for 12-week are available in smoking cessation services. Participants requesting for additional or full course of NRT will be actively refer to the respective services as part of the Referral step in the AWARD model (Ask, Warn, Advise, Refer, and Do-it-again).
The mHealth intervention will be delivered via the most popular instant messaging app in Hong Kong (WhatsApp). A total of 24 messages with contents including the harms of smoking and smoke exposure for children, encouragement, benefits of quitting for children, methods of quitting, dealing with craving, and measures to reduce cigarette smoke exposure at home will be provided. The messages will be scheduled in a tapering schedule that participants will receive 5 messages in the first week, then cut down to 3 messages/week for the next 4 weeks and 1 message/week for the last 7 weeks. Using a more personalized approach, the messages will be tailored to the participants' motivation, intention to quit and other quitting patterns collected at baseline. Real-time conversations could be initiated by participants themselves, triggered by regular messages, or through prompt inquires (e.g., asking about the quitting progress).
At baseline, participants will receive brief face-to-face advice on quitting smoking for the health of the children using the validated AWARD model (Ask, Warn, Advise, Refer, Do-it-again) with a print-based self-help material providing detailed information on health hazards of SHS exposure on children, methods to deal with craving and withdrawal symptoms, and measures on preventing SHS exposure for children at home.
Locations(1)
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NCT07014124