title: Outcome of a four-hour smoking cessation counselling workshop for medical students.
abstract: BACKGROUND
  Lack of smoking cessation education in undergraduate medical training hinders healthcare professionals in providing adequate tobacco cessation counselling. We developed a comprehensive 4-h smoking cessation counselling course for medical students that is easy to incorporate in a medical school curriculum, and assessed its short-term outcome for knowledge, skills, and attitudes.
  
  
  METHODS
  Eighty-eight medical students (53f, 35 m) were educated by a doctoral student in five identical 4-h courses. A 45-min theoretical introduction was followed by patient-physician role-playing by student pairs. Knowledge, skills, and attitude were assessed before and 4 weeks after the course by questionnaires, and by blinded analysis of pre- and post-course videos of a five-minute standardized patient situation.
  
  
  RESULTS
  Knowledge: Before the course 10.6 (mean, SD: 2.7) questions out of 29 were answered correctly, and increased to 19.2 (3.6) after the course (p <0.0005). Major features of the students' counselling skills improved. Significant and highly relevant attitude changes reflected increased motivation to counselling smokers.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  Implementing a four-hour smoking intervention workshop into a medical curriculum was highly effective in improving students' knowledge, skills and attitudes towards smoking counselling, as well as providing them with additional clinical competencies.
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Internal Medicine, University Hospitals of Homburg/ Saar, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany.|Clinic of Pulmonary Medicine and Respiratory Cell Research, University Hospital Basel, Basel, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Kurosch
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Purkabiri
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Internal Medicine, University Hospitals of Homburg/ Saar, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany.
authors.forename: Valentina
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Steppacher
authors.affiliation: Division of Pain Medicine, Berufsgenossenschaftliches Universitätsklinikum Bergmannsheil GmbH, Bochum, Germany.
authors.forename: Kathrin
authors.initials: K
authors.lastname: Bernardy
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Internal Medicine, University Hospitals of Homburg/ Saar, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany.|Divison of Internal Medicine, Hospital of Münsingen, Münsingen, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Nikola
authors.initials: N
authors.lastname: Karl
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Internal Medicine, University Hospitals of Homburg/ Saar, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany.|University Hospital of Psychiatry, Bern, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Verena
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Vedder
authors.affiliation: Clinic of Internal Medicine, Lindenhofspital, Bremgartenstrasse 119, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Michèle
authors.initials: M
authors.lastname: Borgmann
authors.affiliation: Clinic Sonnenhalde, Riehen, Switzerland.|Division of Assessment und Evaluation, Institute for Medical Teaching, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Anja
authors.initials: A
authors.lastname: Rogausch
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Internal Medicine, University Hospitals of Homburg/ Saar, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany.
authors.forename: Uz
authors.initials: U
authors.lastname: Stammberger
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Internal Medicine, University Hospitals of Homburg/ Saar, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany.
authors.forename: Robert
authors.initials: R
authors.lastname: Bals
authors.affiliation: Department of Cardiology and Pneumology, University Hospital Göttingen, Göttingen, Germany.
authors.forename: Tobias
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Raupach
authors.affiliation: Department of Behavioral Therapy and Psychosomatic Medicine, Rehabilitation Center Seehof, Federal German Pension Agency, Teltow, Germany.|Medical Faculty, Saarland University Hospitals, Homburg/Saar, Germany.
authors.forename: Volker
authors.initials: V
authors.lastname: Koellner
authors.affiliation: Division of Pulmonary Medicine, Internal Medicine, University Hospitals of Homburg/ Saar, Saarland University, Homburg/Saar, Germany.|Clinic of Internal Medicine, Lindenhofspital, Bremgartenstrasse 119, CH-3012 Bern, Switzerland.
authors.forename: Jürg
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Hamacher
keywords: Attitude; Communication skills; Curriculum; Knowledge; Medical education; Motivational interviewing; Skills; Smoking cessation counselling; Tobacco cessation education