As a PCP, your involvement in lung cancer risk reduction is critical for reducing the burden of lung cancer. GO2's training tools are designed to help you better serve your patients, prevent lung cancer, and deliver earlier diagnoses and better care to those with lung cancer.
Smoking is the leading cause of lung cancer. It is responsible for about 85-90% of lung cancer cases. As a PCP, your brief advice to quit tobacco use - at ever patient visit - can be powerful. A screening discussion provides an important opportunity and teachable moment to include the topic of smoking cessation. Providers who are familiar with the Clinical Practice Guideline Treating Tobacco Use and Dependence: 2008 Update are best equipped to offer cessation counseling and recommend optimal pharmacotherapy. This guideline and other smoking and tobacco tools are available in our Resource Library.
Offering your patients smoking cessation resources can greatly improve their chances of quitting successfully. Quitline counseling can more than double a smoker's chances of quitting. Importantly, quitline counseling combined with smoking cessation medication, such as nicotine replacement therapy, can more than triple the chances of quitting.
All states have quitlines with coaches /counselors who are trained specifically to help smokers quit. Call 1-800-QUIT-NOW to connect directly to your state's quiteline*. Hours of operation and services vary from state to state.
Some state quitlines offer additional resources, including:
Contact your state's quitline by calling 1-800-QUIT-NOW to get accurate, up-to-date information about your state.
This National Cancer Institute website provides free, accurate, evidence-based information and professional assistance to help support the immediate and long-term needs of people trying to quit smoking.
This site offers:
The American Lung Association's Freedom from Smoking® includes a variety of support options including the Freedom From Smoking Plus online interface, group clinics, a self-help guide, Lung HelpLine (1-800-LUNGUSA) with specialists for telephone counseling, and a moderated online support community.
The FDA has approved seven medications to help even further with cessation success. Counseling combined with Nicotine Replacement Therapy, or NRT, and/or other medication offers the best chance for success. Since patients shouldn't chew the cum, suck the lozenge, inhale the inhaler, or sniff the nasal spray, be sure to guide your patients on how to use each of these products so they can be the most effective.
Learn more about these NRT and other medications in our Resource Library:
The second leading cause of lung cancer is radon exposure. More than 20,000 lung cancer deaths per year are related to radon. Exposure to the combination of radon gas and cigarette smoke creates a greater risk of ling cancer than either factor alone.
Radon is the number one cause of lung cancer among nonsmokers, causing nearly 3,000 nonsmoker deaths per year. The EPA estimates that one in ever 15 homes nationwide has a high radon level - at or above the recommended action level. That level is 4 picoCuries per liter of air. Providers should recommend to patients that they test their homes for elevated radon levels. Test kits may be available for free from state radon programs or local health departments, and can also be purchased at home improvement stores. These short-term tests are usually left for a few days in the lowest level of the home and then sent to a lab for results. If needed, radon mitigation contractors can put a ventilation system into the home to reduce radon levels to acceptable levels.
