Tobacco use remains a persistent health issue in Canada, but is often under treated. In particular, low-income women who smoke face socially complex factors that impact tobacco reduction and cessation, including experiences of trauma and violence, caregiving burdens, financial stress, and housing and food insecurity. In Canada, there is a critical need to improve tobacco reduction and cessation support specifically designed for women who experience such inequities.
The Centre of Excellence for Women’s Health is developing the Liberation intervention, a virtual social support group for tobacco reduction for/with low-income women. This program is emerging in partnership with women’s resource centres across the country.
What is our approach?
Liberation will:
- Expand women’s understanding of sex/gender, economic, historical, and socio-structural factors influencing smoking and cessation, while increasing women’s coping skills and knowledge of reduction and cessation treatments and aids.
- Strengthen women’s ability to manage financial and emotional stress.
- Support women’s tobacco reduction and cessation through access to peer support, sharing of successes and challenges, tools for goal setting and planning for change, self-efficacy, mindfulness, ability to manage withdrawal symptoms and cravings, relapse prevention strategies, and self-compassion.
- Reach women’s resource centres, tobacco cessation services, and healthcare providers with information and resources on tobacco cessation for low-income women who smoke.
Principles informing the Liberation intervention:
- Strengths/resilience-based
- Trauma-informed
- Harm reduction and relapse prevention oriented
- Inclusive of social and structural determinants of health
- Evidence-based
- Centred on women’s voices and lived experiences
Who are we working with?
We are working with women’s resource centres across Canada to pilot and implement the Liberation program. Following a pilot at two women’s resource centres, we are now expanding implementation. If you’re interested in becoming an implementation partner site, please connect with us at: research@cewh.ca
Key Resources
- Our previous work on women and tobacco, including info sheets and guides, toolkits, reports, training, journal articles and participation in the International Network of Women Against Tobacco (INWAT), described here
- Information sheet for women interested in the Liberation virtual social support program English
- Information sheet for service providers describing the Liberation virtual social support program English
CEWH acknowledges the financial support of Health Canada, Substance Use and Addictions Program