Area Health Education Centers offer statewide tobacco cessation programs
Implementing a new tobacco cessation program mandated by voters, the
Florida Area Health Education Centers (AHEC) Network is offering
cessation classes from one end of the state to the other and is nearing
its goal of creating programs in all 67 counties.
“Smoking
kills 28,700 adult Floridians each year and costs the state’s economy
$20 billion a year,” said Dr. Arthur Fournier, president of the Florida
AHEC Network. “Dr. Fournier is director of the University of Miami
AHEC Program and a professor at the UM Miller School of Medicine.”
“An estimated one of five adult Floridians smoke, and many of them
would like to kick the habit but don’t know where to turn,” Dr.
Fournier said. “AHEC cessation programs offered in communities all
over Florida are the place for them to go to get the support they need
to quit smoking.”
(For information on AHEC cessation programs in your area, please see attachment.)
The AHEC cessation programs are taught by specially trained cessation
counselors versed in state-of-the-art cessation techniques. Classes
are offered at a wide variety of locations, and the AHEC cessation
counselors also refer smokers interested in quitting to the Florida
Department of Health’s toll-free, statewide smoking cessation telephone counseling hotline -- Quitline (1-877-U-CAN NOW).
The AHEC Network is comprised of program offices at five Florida
medical schools and 10 regional centers covering the entire state. The
Network runs the cessation programs under contract with the Department
of Health as part of the $57 million anti-tobacco program mandated by
voters in a 2006 constitutional amendment.
AHEC Centers
operate smoking cessation programs at a wide variety of community
sites, including county health departments, community health centers
and clinics, hospitals, churches and workplaces. Other unique sites
include the Marion County Sheriff’s Office, Florida Southern College
and the Brevard County School District.
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