TXTTaofiTapaa: pilot trial of a Samoan mobile phone smoking cessation programme

Abstract

Back Background ground Smoking remains a major risk factor to good health across the Pacific region. Samoa, like other Pacific nations, has signed up to the Framework Convention on Tobacco Control (FCTC) to reduce the prevalence through actions including providing smoking cessation services. A text message cessation programme that had been proven successful in New Zealand was adapted and trialled in Samoa. The aims of this study were to trial the Samoan mCessation programme TXTTaofiTapaa to determine the feasibility, acceptability and potential to help smokers in Samoa to quit. Methods Methods One hundred smokers across Samoa were recruited to the trial but early technical issues meant not all received the programme immediately and therefore were not able to be followed up. R Results esults Of the 72 participants providing follow up data, 28 (38.9%) reported abstinence for at least seven days at 1-month follow up. In addition, 68 (94.4%) said they liked the programme, 61 (84.7%) said they thought it would be effective for Samoans, 67 (93.1%) said they would recommend the programme to others, and 37 (15.9%) said that it helped them to try to quit smoking at least once. C Conclusions onclusions Delivering a text message cessation programme (TXTTaofiTapaa) in Samoa is feasible, and smokers in Samoa appear to find it to be both acceptable and helpful. Implications Implications This study adds to our knowledge about the adaptation of proven effective technology based smoking cessation interventions from high income countries with multifaceted tobacco control strategies, to different contexts. In this case, dealing with differences in culture, language, and the tobacco control environment.

The characteristics of behaviour change interventions used among Pacific people: a systematic search and narrative synthesis

“…Fifteen studies were conducted in the USA -Hawai'i [43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55], California [56] and Arkansas [57], as well as its associated territories of American Samoa [58,59] and the Marshall Islands [60]. Seven were based in New Zealand [61][62][63][64][65][66][67] including one in Australia [68] and one in Samoa [69]. Most studies involved Native Hawaiians residing in the state of Hawai'i.…”

“…Two studies compared Pacific and Indigenous Māori [65,66]. Nine studies were ethnic-specific focusing only on Native Hawaiians [49,51], American Samoan [58,59], Marshallese [57,60], and Samoan [63,68,69] populations. Studies were published between 1996 and 2020.…”

“…Among the twenty-seven studies included in the review, eleven were randomised controlled trials [44,45,48,53,55,58,59,65,66,69] and thirteen were non randomised studies [43,46,47,49,51,52,56,57,60,62,64,67,68]. Other studies used a quasi-experimental design [63], a prospective uncontrolled cohort study [61] and a descriptive intervention study [50].…”

“…Ten studies increased awareness and targeted health behaviour change in people with diabetes [45, 48, 50, 57-60, 62, 64, 68] and eight studies targeted weight loss [43,44,46,47,51,54,63,67]. Others targeted chronic disease selfmanagement [52], and health-related behaviour [66], hypertension [53,65], smoking cessation [69], heart failure [55], renal disease [61], physical activity [56], and physical activity and nutrition combined [49]. Overall, diabetes was the most common long term condition focused in the studies.…”

“…Another study was informed by a Pacific nutrition train the trainer workshop for Pacific people living in New Zealand [67]. Thirteen studies were adapted for Native Hawaiian's and Pacific Islanders living in Hawai'i [43][44][45][46][47][48][49][50][51][52][53][54][55], four were adapted for Samoans residing in American Samoa [58,59], Australia [68] and Samoa [69], and two studies were adapted for Marshallese Islanders living in Arkansas [57] and the Marshall Islands [60]. Ten studies [43,44,46,47,53,54,56,57,67,68] stated they used a CBPR approach where research leads partnered with Pacific communities and organisations who informed the cultural and community adaptation of programmes.…”