Article Text

Download PDFPDF

Effectiveness of a national reimbursement policy and accompanying media attention on use of cessation treatment and on smoking cessation: a real-world study in the Netherlands
  1. Gera E Nagelhout1,2,
  2. Marc C Willemsen1,2,
  3. Bas van den Putte3,4,
  4. Hein de Vries1,
  5. Roy A Willems5,
  6. Dewi Segaar2
  1. 1Department of Health Promotion, Maastricht University (CAPHRI), Maastricht, The Netherlands
  2. 2Alliance Smokefree Holland, The Hague, The Netherlands
  3. 3Department of Communication, University of Amsterdam (ASCoR), Amsterdam, The Netherlands
  4. 4Trimbos Institute, Netherlands Institute for Mental Health and Addiction, Utrecht, The Netherlands
  5. 5School of Psychology, Open University of the Netherlands, Heerlen, The Netherlands
  1. Correspondence to Dr Gera Nagelhout, Alliantie Nederland Rookvrij, Eisenhowerlaan 108, The Hague 2517 KL, The Netherlands; Gera.Nagelhout{at}alliantieNR.nl

Abstract

Background In 2011, the Netherlands implemented a national policy that ensured that health insurance companies reimbursed behavioural counselling for smoking cessation or the combination of behavioural counselling with pharmacological therapy.

Objective To examine the real-world impact of a national reimbursement policy and accompanying media attention on use of cessation treatment and on smoking cessation.

Methods We used a four-wave longitudinal survey among 2763 adult smokers that started in September 2010 and was repeated at approximately 3 month intervals until June 2011. Two survey waves were conducted before the implementation of the policy and two survey waves after.

Findings There were significant increases in quit attempts (among moderate-to-heavy smokers) and in quit success (among all smokers) following the implementation of the reimbursement policy and the media attention. Use of behavioural counselling did not increase, while use of pharmacological therapy without behavioural counselling (unreimbursed treatment) increased among moderate-to-heavy smokers. Attention to media about the reimbursement was significantly associated with more quit attempts and more quit success. Awareness of the policy was significantly associated with more use of reimbursed treatment among all smokers, while attention to the media coverage was only significantly associated with more use of reimbursed treatment among moderate-to-heavy smokers. Awareness/attention variables were not significantly associated with use of unreimbursed treatment.

Conclusions It seems that a national reimbursement policy for smoking cessation treatment that is accompanied by media attention can increase cessation. Our findings suggest that this increase can (partly) be ascribed to the media attention that accompanied the policy implementation.

  • Cessation
  • Media
  • Public policy

Statistics from Altmetric.com

Request Permissions

If you wish to reuse any or all of this article please use the link below which will take you to the Copyright Clearance Center’s RightsLink service. You will be able to get a quick price and instant permission to reuse the content in many different ways.