Housing evidence / case study · working draft
Ottawa Model: smoking treatment during and after hospital
Nine hospitals built smoking identification, bedside support and follow-up into routine care.
01 / THE APPROACH
What was tried
The Ottawa Model helps hospitals identify patients who smoke, document their smoking status, offer advice and medication, and arrange support after discharge.
Trained outreach facilitators helped nine hospitals in eastern Ontario introduce the approach. The evaluation examined whether hospitals could deliver each part consistently, alongside patients' smoking outcomes six months after admission.
02 / THE FINDINGS
What was learned
The intervention reached 69% of the expected number of smokers. Estimated six-month continuous abstinence increased from 18.3% before implementation to 29.4% afterwards.
Researchers checked smoking status biochemically in a sample and adjusted overall estimates for possible misreporting. Hospitals delivered counselling more consistently than medication or follow-up.
03 / TRANSFER TO WALES
What Wales could learn
Hospitals needed staff to identify smoking, offer treatment and arrange follow-up, with facilitators helping teams put the pathway into practice.
Counselling was easier to embed than medication supply and follow-up. A hospital improving its offer can use that distinction to check where patients are dropping out of its own pathway.
Sources & review
Reid et al., Smoking cessation for hospitalized smokers: an evaluation of the Ottawa Model. Nicotine & Tobacco Research 12(1), 11–18. DOI 10.1093/ntr/ntp165. Public primary abstract checked 23 October 2026. This is distinct from the hub's Ottawa Community Housing policy case.
