COMPUTER ASSISTED TREATMENT FOR UNDERSERVED SMOKERS

The proposed project will develop a multimedia computer expert system providing smoking cessation assistance patients and the physicians who treat them. This system is a practical application for the medical office setting and easily operated by both physician's and their patients. The software design incorporates multi-lingual, written, audio, and graphic presentation of assessment questions and answer selection options, rendering it especially accessible to low-literacy and minority (non-English speaking) populations. These groups have presented a challenge for treatment in that they are often hard to reach, and motivate, have limited resources and have limited access to preventive are. Increasing underserved populations are treated through managed care systems where health care provider time is limited. The proposed expert system will enhance provider capacity to treat smoking by providing individualized assessment of key factors important to smoking cessation, and provide feedback to the physician and individually tailored counseling messages directly to the patient. Prior work has demonstrated that individualized feedback has superior efficacy to standardized interventions for smoking cessation. Following programming and initial development, the expert system will be pilot tested for user acceptance in a hospital-based primary care clinic.