Dudley Strategy for Tackling Health Inequalities 2010-15

1. Stop Smoking Service ProvisionDudley Stop Smoking Service (DSSS) delivers an NHS quality, evidence based stopsmoking service, targeting smokers from deprived communities and hard to reachgroups. DSSS commissions stop smoking services and acts as a provider as a lastresort for a small number of service areas where no other provider is available. Theservice network comprises:One-to-one support in GP practices and community pharmacies. Currently88% of GPs and 77% of pharmacies in Dudley provide this service.One-to-one and group support in workplace settingsOne-to-one support for Dudley Group of Hospital „in and out‟ patients.Group support on a rolling programme basis in community venues across theborough. Groups are co-delivered by trained volunteers.Drop-in clinics and groups in schools and clinics provided by trained StopSmoking Specialists (School Health Advisors, Children‟s Centre staff)Intensive one-to-one support for pregnant women and their family in the homesetting.Health Equity AuditDSSS carries out a health equity audit (HEA) every 2 years to provide a detailedprofile of clients attending the service to establish if service provision anddevelopments are delivering equitable services in proportion to smoking prevalencerates from social class groups across Dudley. The most recent HEA was completedin 2010 and identified that the number of people accessing the service has beenincreasing year on year with over 25,000 smokers having accessed the service inthe period April 2002 to March 2009.Figure 3 shows the proportion of clients accessing DSSS by the Index of MultipleDeprivation 2007 (IMD, 2007) by national quintile. There is a significant negativetrend in the proportion accessing DSSS from the most deprived to the least deprivedpeople in Dudley. The proportion accessing DSSS in the 20% most deprived areasof Dudley is four times that of people in the 20% least deprived areas. Thishighlights that the service is responding to the increased need identified earlier bythe high smoking prevalence in this group. There has been a significant increase inthe proportion of people accessing DSSS from the 20% most deprived areas in thelast seven years and a corresponding decline for clients from the 20% least deprivedareas.97