Community Based Automated Smoking Assessment

DESCRIPTION (provided by investigator): The purpose of this Phase I project is to develop and test the feasibility of a community-based automated smoking assessment (CASA) system. The program will utilize automated and interactive voice recognition telephone systems augmented by Internet database systems to provide automated longitudinal assessment of smoking status variables to provide evaluation services to state and local tobacco control efforts. With increasing resources and efforts in state and local tobacco control, accountability regarding the outcome of these efforts has grown increasingly important. The proposed community-based automated smoking assessment program (CASA) is an integrated phone and Internet delivered database system designed to provide automated longitudinal assessment of smoking status to registered participants in any community-based smoking cessation intervention. After an iterative development process using interview feedback from smoking researchers and tobacco control officials, the feasibility of the system will be evaluated in a small community-based intervention effort with 100 adult smokers. The percentage of complete data, concurrent validity with live interview data, and ratings of usability will serve as the primary feasibility criteria for this system. PROPOSED COMMERCIAL APPLICATIONS: With increasing demands for accountability of tobacco control efforts, the need for an easily implemented longitudinal assessment of tobacco use is likely to increase. Despite less than 10% of tobacco settlement dollars utilized for tobacco control efforts, over 750 million dollars have been allocated by states in 2000 and 2001 for tobacco control initiatives. In addition to state and local tobacco control efforts, smoking researchers and other entities (e.g. managed care organizations) may find this system useful for their needs. Using an application service provider (ASP) commercial model, the CASA system can be delivered efficiently and inexpensively.