Clinical evaluation of e-Quit worRx: a mobile app to enhance smoking cessation shared decision making in primary care

Smoking is the leading preventable cause of morbidity and mortality in the United States. Primary care providers (PCPs) have a unique opportunity to engage patients to quit smoking, but to be effective, clinicians must be able to personalize evidence-based interventions that are useful and appealing to patients in a time efficient manner. We pilot tested a novel iPad application (app), called e-Quit worRx™, designed to enhance patient-centered shared-decision making (SDM) about smoking cessation, with the primary goal of determining feasibility in primary care offices.

A total of 73 patients from three offices within a local diverse primary care network were enrolled in a pragmatic single crossover-controlled trial. The decision aid app was incorporated into current smokers' waiting time for their PCP in the exam room, and their PCP reviewed their personal responses and selections to finalize treatment choices. Mixed methods were used in the evaluation and the primary outcomes were app feasibility in primary care and enhanced SDM.

Our app was determined to be feasible for use in primary care for both patients and PCPs. It significantly increased time spent discussing smoking cessation with their PCP and the likelihood that a decision was made at the time of the visit. While not significant, mean differences were observed in other study measures including SDM, decisional conflict, quality of patient-provider communication, and stage of change progression at 12 weeks post-trial.

We created a usable and acceptable iPad app-based decision aid for use in primary care offices. The design process presented several challenges including integration into a clinical setting. Despite these challenges, we successfully ran a pragmatic pilot trial in three primary care offices using a technology novel to many of the users.