Smoke free health care: an organisational change to increase effective intervention for tobacco.

Abstract

In 1999, the NSW Health Smoke Free Workplace Policy directed that grounds of health sites would become smoke free, in addition to the existing policy requiring smoke-free buildings. This was one of the first attempts by any health service to exclude tobacco entirely from health sites. This task required the adoption of evidence-based management of tobacco dependence and changing the culture of smoking in the health service. There were many barriers to implementation.