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“Since quitting I don’t smell of cigarette smoke any more, my children are happy and I feel so much healthier”

Sue Dargan, Greater Manchester

Smoke Free Family Life

Smoke Free Family Life (SFFL) is a holistic programme working with young people in schools and their families to encourage parents and carers to take the steps to quit smoking and prevent young people from starting. We do this through interaction between the parents and children as well as local media and the Local Stop Smoking service

Recommendations

“North Somerset Council commissioned Quit to deliver the Smoke Free Family Life (SFFL) Programme to 36 primary schools in 2014-15. Over 3000 pupils in Years 4 to 6 received the intervention. The SFFL programme aims to address key issues in tobacco control; prevention of youth uptake and supports parents who wish to quit.

The results from local evaluation of the SFFL programme are very exciting and are helping us better understand what works in preventing young people starting smoking. We look forward to working with QUIT in the future and would not hesitate to recommend SFFL as a key part of any local tobacco control programme”.

North Somerset Council, Public Health, August 2015

“Buckinghamshire Council and QUIT have worked together for many years, recently on the Smoke Free Family Life and Smoke Free Family Christmas Projects. SFFL enable councils to address two key issues of tobacco control; Youth Prevention and Smoking Cessation by tackling the factor that most influences a child’s decisions about smoking; adult smoking.

QUIT are responsive to our needs and have built excellent relationships with our schools. QUIT are a trusted brand when it comes to delivering smoking prevention to young people. The results from SFFL are very exciting and are helping us better understand what works in youth prevention. I would not hesitate to recommend this as a key part of any local tobacco control programme.”

Public Health Buckinghamshire Council July 2015

The pilot

Smoke Free Family Life follows the model used for the Smoke Free Family Christmas pilot in 2012.

The pilot ran in 10 schools and reached more than 2,000 young people. Presentations were delivered to pupils in years 7-9. Each young person received two booklets; one for themselves and one for their parents. More than 22,000 adults were reached via the media campaign.

Sample booklets

Smoke Free Family Life for Parents

Smoke Free Family Life for Primary Schools

Smoke Free Family Life for Youth

The pilot results had great impact. According to self-reported evaluation questionnaires 40% of young people reported that they talked to their parents about the presentation.

As a result of this interaction between parents and children 62% of adult smokers reported that they would make a quit attempt which raised the following questions…

Could this holistic way of working and interacting with parents and young people have caused a significant shift in intentions and motivation?

Did this pilot break new ground?

SMOKE FREE FAMILY LIFE 2014/15

As a result of the pilot’s impact QUIT wants to run as many of these projects in partnership with Local Councils, Public Health teams and local schools, taking into account the following changes and improvements from the pilot.

  • Presentations in Secondary Schools for pupils years 7-9 and Primary Schools years 4-6. This is the age where young people are likely to think about starting to smoke in the future
  • A robust methodology and evaluation is being carried out by Professor Robert West – a leading global expert in smoking cessation – and his team at University College London
  • New booklets are being created including information on how to successfully quit smoking and information of the local services available
  • We will work very closely with local stop smoking services in order to track the number of successful quits and also the clinical commissioner group
  • Larger radio campaigns that cover whole counties

This effective model:

  • Impacts both children and parents. Children are less likely to take up smoking and parents more likely to give up smoking
  • The booklets designed for young people encourage them to share their knowledge of smoking with their parents
  • The booklets are attractively designed so that they engage both young people and their parents

For further information on the above project please contact Nick Faraday, Head of Youth Services:

Email: n.faraday@quit.org.uk

Telephone: 0207 553 2108

Email: g.soares@quit.org.uk

Telephone: 0207 553 2153