What are the barriers to an Asian-language quitline service?

Telephone quitline services have been shown to be effective for smoking cessation. According to 15 years of data from California, Asian-language smokers have been active users of a quitline service. However, most state quitlines do not offer counseling directly in Asian languages, which increases disparities in access to effective treatment for the Asian population. This study examined the organizational readiness of state health departments and quitline operators to adopt an Asian-language quitline service. Data were collected from 32 state health departments and 9 quitline operators using the Organization Readiness Survey, an instrument which assesses 11 attributes such as cost advantage, effectiveness, applicability, and compatibility with existing practices. About half (47.3%) of potential adopters believed Asian-language smokers would use counseling to help them quit smoking and 27.8% perceived that counseling would work for this population. However, only 2.4% of potential adopters reported that they were ready to implement an Asian-language quitline. The most prominent barrier was applicability: The majority (69.4%) of the respondents reported that there are too few Asian-language tobacco users in their state to warrant staffing a quitline with Asian-language staff and providing separate-language phone lines. Another major barrier was cost: 58.3% of potential adopters indicated that the cost of staffing the quitline and providing separate-language phone lines would be prohibitive. This presentation will discuss how a multi-state Asian-language quitline could address these barriers and reduce the disparity in access to treatment.