Proposing a Model of Proactive Outreach to Advance Clinical Research and Care Delivery for Patients Who Use Tobacco

There are evidence-based treatments for tobacco dependence, but inequities exist in the access to and reach of these treatments. Traditional models of tobacco treatment delivery are reactive and typically provide treatment only to patients who are highly motivated to quit and seek out tobacco treatment. Newer models involve proactive outreach, with benefits that include increasing access to tobacco treatment, prompting quit attempts among patients with low motivation, addressing health disparities, and improving population-level quit rates. However, the definition of proactive is not clear, and adoption has been slow. This commentary introduces a comprehensive yet flexible model of proactive outreach and describes how proactive outreach can optimize clinical research and care delivery in these domains: (1) identifying the population, (2) offering treatment, and (3) delivering treatment. Dimensions relevant to each domain are the intensity of proactive outreach (low to high) and the extent to which proactive outreach activities rely on human interaction or are facilitated by information technology (IT). Adoption of the proposed proactive outreach model could improve the precision and rigor with which tobacco cessation research and tobacco treatment programs report data, which could have a positive effect on care delivery and patient outcomes.(C) The Author(s) 2022

Automated summary

Evidence-based treatments for tobacco dependence face inequities in access, with traditional models being reactive and newer models promoting proactive outreach. The proposed comprehensive and flexible proactive outreach model aims to optimize clinical research and care delivery by focusing on population identification, treatment offer, and treatment delivery with varying levels of intensity and reliance on human interaction or IT.