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 $600 billion a year, including over $241 billion in direct medical care for adults and $184 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 HelpLineInfo@lung.org.
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.
Highlights of the Freedom From Smoking® curriculum include:
- Thinking about, wanting to, preparing to quit
- Nicotine replacement therapy
- Tobacco cessation medications, such as Zyban® and Chantix®
- Preparing for quit day
- Coping strategies
- Managing stress
- Avoiding weight gain
- Building a new self-image
- Handling social situations
- Preventing relapse
- Avoiding secondhand smoke
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 HelpLineInfo@lung.org 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
Testimonials
“Are you willing to quit? If someone were to offer you a proven effective means (Freedom from Smoking) of being able to quit those cigarettes, would you partake? You know, there is help out there, real meaningful help, and people who are really truly interested because they understand those dangers.”
“I had wanted to quit for some time, but I did not think that I could ever quit. I did not think it was possible. I did not have hope that anything would work for me because I smoked through four pregnancies and if I could not quit for my kids, it just probably was not in the cards. I have also been a recovered alcoholic for 12 years. But the Freedom from Smoking® program taught me so many things, including how to be really kind and fair to myself. My Freedom from Smoking® Facilitator was a really big support to me as well. Since quitting through the Freedom from Smoking® program I have designed a new life. I have even become a Freedom from Smoking® Facilitator because this clinic helped me so much, I want to help others in the local Easter Seals community.”
Smoking was like living in a prison. I was always thinking, “When can I have my next cigarette?” Everything took so much longer than it should have, because I would have to finish my cigarette before I could go into a store or find a place to smoke. The main reason I wanted to quit was because of my new niece, Emri. I wanted to see her grow up, and realized smoking was not going to allow me to do that.
Easter Seals Iowa offers health insurance incentive dollars; if I completed the Freedom from Smoking class, I would qualify for the incentive. I took the class online, and I was given tools to help me quit. I also had a lot of support from the Wellness Team at Easter Seals Iowa. The onsite Freedom from Smoking® Facilitators that work at our site were huge cheerleaders, and it helped that I saw them every day when they dropped off and picked up their kids at the Child Development Center. They never judged for slipping and always provided moral support. I found Chantix to get me started. I discovered it did make me nauseous, so eating right after I took it was important. Eventually I didn’t even want cigarettes and recently stopped using it. I was smoker from the age of 13, which is most of my life. On March 22, 2018, I quit completely, after 30 years of smoking!
Now I’m feeling inspired to make other healthy choices and am meeting with a dietician to help with meal planning. I am not coughing all of the time and waking myself up in coughing fits. I am breathing better and find that I am not out of breath all of the time. I was also diagnosed with hypertension and my blood pressure would run as high as 180/120, which is stroke level. The last couple of times I have been to the doctor is has been 106/67, which is lower than it has ever been. I have a more positive outlook on life and I actually feel like a nonsmoker.
I went on a trip with some friends recently. We went on a hike and I beat them to the top of a hill! It seems like a small thing, but before I quit smoking, I would have just sat in the cabin while my friends went exploring. It feels amazing, and I can’t thank Easter Seals Iowa and the Freedom from Smoking® for literally helping me take back my life! I haven’t really noticed the extra money in my pocket, but I think that’s because I spend it all on my niece!
Thank you to the American Lung Association Freedom from Smoking® facilitators for their time and effort in leading and guiding our first group of employees at the Iowa Veterans Home through the inaugural Freedom from Smoking® clinic. The information and tools provided were invaluable to our employees that wanted to quit smoking and for me, as a newly trained Freedom from Smoking® facilitator. We were successful at Iowa Veteran’s Home with ongoing clinics because of the resources and teaching that the American Lung Association provided.
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]
- u X, Shreshta SS, Trivers KF, Neff L, Armour BS, King BA. U.S. Healthcare Spending Attributable to Cigarette Smoking in 2014. Preventive Medicine. 2021. https://www.ajpmonline.org/article/S0749-3797(22)00294-X/fulltext
Page last updated: October 23, 2024
