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In this third issue of Cessation Benefits Focus, we focus on how to design a tobacco cessation benefit with the goal of increasing the likelihood that plan participants will use the benefit and succeed in quitting. This issue addresses the key components of a comprehensive cessation benefit, benefit costs, calculation of return-on-investment (ROI), and benefit design, including sample SPD language, and includes two, one-page fact sheets—one on tobacco cessation counseling and the other on tobacco cessation medications.

» Read the October 2009 issue of Cessation Benefits Focus PDF, 1.06 Mb

 

 

» An overview of tobacco cessation medications PDF, 1314 Kb

 

 

» An overview of tobacco cessation counseling PDF, 112 Kb

 

 

WorkSHIFTS Presents at the National Conference on Tobacco or Health

WorkSHIFTS recently presented at the 2009 National Conference on Tobacco or Health (NCTOH), held in Phoenix, Arizona on June 10 – 12.  NCTOH brings together a diverse array of leaders in the tobacco control community including health care providers, advocates, policymakers, public health practitioners, and legal experts.  Bernie Hesse, UFCW Local 789, and Alison Moore, WorkSHIFTS staff member, presented a poster highlighting the efforts of WorkSHIFTS to address smoking cessation in the labor community.  The presentation, Influencing Taft-Hartley Funds to Provide and Promote Tobacco Cessation Benefits, described findings from a previous research study investigating health benefit decision-making among Taft-Hartley Health and Welfare Funds.  For more information about the presentation, please feel free to contact Alison Moore at alison.moore@wmitchell.edu or Susan Weisman at susan.weisman@wmitchell.edu.

» View the WorkSHIFTS poster, "Influencing Taft-Hartley Funds to Provide and Promote Tobacco Cessation Benefits" PDF, 5.46 Mb

 

 

About WorkSHIFTS

WorkSHIFTS is a program of the Tobacco Law Center, working with the labor community in Minnesota to provide education, training, and technical assistance to Minnesota workers and labor management about the health risks and economic consequences of tobacco use and exposure to tobacco smoke in the workplace.

WorkSHIFTS key activities include:

• Actively involving labor leaders in the development of educational, training, and resource materials that inform their coworkers about health, safety, and economic issues related to tobacco use and exposure to secondhand smoke in the workplace.
• Providing training for labor leaders so they can share with union members information about tobacco, its relationship to other workplace toxins, the benefits of quitting smoking, how these concerns can be addressed with voluntary workplace smoke-free initiatives, collective bargaining, and other mechanisms to produce policy changes.
• Providing resources for labor and management to develop workplace tobacco policies that improve and protect the health of employees, including cessation coverage and tobacco-free workplace campus policies.
• Working closely with labor unions, public health organizations, and others in Minnesota and beyond that share a commitment to worker health and safety and seek to protect workers and safeguard their rights.
• Engaging in community-academic research that supports evidence-based policiies to improve health and reduce the harm of tobacco use among blue-collar workers.
   

WorkSHIFTS is funded by ClearWay Minnesota.