Birmingham Hospitals Enhance Stop Smoking Support for Outpatients
New service expansion across Queen Elizabeth, Heartlands, and Good Hope Hospitals offers specialist behavioural support and free treatments for local residents.
By Aisha Mahmood
••3 min read
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Generic image of a hand holding a smoking cessation aid in a hospital setting.
Hospitals across Birmingham are expanding their stop smoking support services for patients attending outpatient appointments, aiming to improve health outcomes and recovery rates.
University Hospitals Birmingham (UHB) has extended its stop smoking service throughout the trust. Funded by Birmingham City Council Public Health, the initiative is available to all Birmingham residents who attend UHB outpatient sites. There is a particular focus on respiratory, pre-operative assessment, and cancer services, where quitting smoking can significantly enhance treatment results and recovery periods.
The service is now operational at Queen Elizabeth Hospital, Heartlands Hospital, and Good Hope Hospital. This launch comes at a time when smoking continues to have a considerable impact on public health in the city. Data indicates that approximately 10.2% of adults in Birmingham smoke, and local hospital records show thousands of annual admissions are linked to smoking-related illnesses such as COPD, pneumonia, lung cancer, and cardiovascular disease.
Patients will receive expert behavioural support alongside complimentary stop smoking treatments, including nicotine replacement therapy and vapes. Assistance can be provided either face-to-face or over the phone, with regular follow-ups during a quit attempt to ensure accessibility.
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"Smoking is still one of the biggest drivers of ill health and hospital admissions in Birmingham. For a lot of people, the hardest part of quitting isn't wanting to stop, it's knowing where to turn for help. This service puts that support right in front of them, in hospital, exactly when quitting can make a big difference to health outcomes."
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"By funding this service directly into UHB's outpatient pathways, we're removing the barrier of people having to seek out help separately, and I'd encourage anyone eligible to get in touch."
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"Smoking remains one of the leading preventable causes of disease, contributing to cardiovascular and respiratory illness, cancer and poorer outcomes following medical and surgical treatment. Smoking cessation can deliver substantial clinical benefits, including improved treatment response, reduced complications and better long-term health outcomes."
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"By integrating specialist smoking cessation support into our outpatient services and NHS staff clinic, we aim to make evidence-based interventions more accessible to patients and colleagues, helping them achieve sustained abstinence and better health."
Patients can be referred by a UHB clinical team or self-refer directly to the service by emailing quitsmoking@uhb.nhs.uk.
To be eligible, patients must be aged 18 or over, registered as a UHB patient, live, work or be registered with a GP within a Birmingham City Council ward, and currently smoke and be willing to make a quit attempt.
