Social support intervention for enhancing smoking treatment utilization and cessation among veterans in the United States: A pilot study

Objective Social support interventions may enhance access and use of evidence-based tobacco cessation treatments (EBCTs). We assessed the feasibility of a proactive social support intervention for Veterans who smoke. Methods We used national Veterans Health Administration (VHA) data to identify Veterans who smoke cigarettes in the United States. We mailed invitation letters to a random national sample, followed by telephone outreach. Veteran-support person dyads were randomly assigned to intervention or control conditions. Support persons in the intervention group additionally received a 1-call coaching session. Assessments were conducted at baseline, 1-month, and 4-months post-randomization. Data collection occurred from March 2021 – August 2022. Results A total of 27 dyads were randomized. Two-thirds of Veteran participants were women. Veteran follow-up survey response rates were 81.5 %. Intervention participants reported a higher rate of cessation medication use (57.1 % vs. 30.8 %), use of any EBCT (64.3 % vs. 38.5 %), and biochemically confirmed seven-day point-prevalence abstinence (14.3 % vs 7.7 %) than control participants. The proactive recruitment rate was 6 % for Veterans, 74 % for support persons, and a 93 % support person completion rate for the coaching call intervention. Conclusions Recruitment methods were feasible, especially for women Veterans. A proactive social support intervention shows promise for increasing Veteran utilization of EBCTs.