Heart Failure Patients Given Smoking Cessation Advice/Counseling

What Does This Measure?

The percentage of heart failure patients with a history of smoking cigarettes who were given information or counseling to help them quit smoking.

Why Is This Important?

Studies have shown that smoking increases the risk of blood clots, causes arteries to thicken, and narrows the blood vessels, increasing the risk for a heart attack, heart failure, or stroke.

Patients who receive advice or counseling about quitting smoking are more likely to quit than those who do not.

What Are We Doing to Improve Our Performance?

Duke has enacted several initiatives to improve our performance. These include:

• Evidence-based medicine
• Smoking cessation programs and patient education information
• Computerized physician order entry (CPOE)
• Standardized order sets
• Patient rounding
• Electronic medical records (EMR)
• Nursing and physician education
• Heart failure-specific discharge instructions and patient education information
• Patient safety and clinical quality committees
• Patient advocacy and support groups
  
• Tobacco-free campus
  

More Information

• See more heart failure quality measures
• See all performance measures
• Compare Duke to other North Carolina hospitals at NC Hospital Quality Report
• Compare Duke to regional and national hospitals at Hospital Quality Alliance's Hospital Compare