Tom Baker Cancer Centre Smoking Cessation Clinic

The activities of this program include behaviour modification, stress management, self-hypnosis, education, support for smoking cessation delivered by two psychosocial professionals.

Evaluation Approach
The evaluation of this program includes written evaluation forms for each session. Occasionally evaluations are sent to non-successful clients. Telephone follow-up is routinely completed for successful clients at 6 months and 1 year following participation in the program. Final session evaluations have been gathered for 5-9 years of group discussions.

Reason for Success
The program evaluation is successful because it provides a lot of feedback and is fairly thorough. The telephone follow-up process is also an opportunity to offer additional support to the successful and unsuccessful clients.

Learning
Through the evaluation, we learned that our program is shaped by evaluations. We have thrown out innovations that consumers found least helpful and have built on those ideas found most helpful. Evaluation guides the program and, as a result, the program is constantly evolving.

Challenges
The challenges of doing this evaluation were time and making contact with participants, especially in the long term follow up.

Contact Information:
Janice Koopmans, Clinical Social Worker
Address: 1331 29 St NW
City: Calgary, T2N 4N2
Fax: 403-944-1711
email: jankoopm@cancerboard.ab.ca