An 2006.

Study characteristics
Methods	Design: Randomized controlled trial Setting: Primary care clinics of Veterans Affairs Medical Centers, USA Recruitment: Invitation letter to primary care patients
Participants	837 people who smoked daily, 26 cpd, av.age 57, 10% F
Interventions	Intervention: participants received behavioral counseling via telephone (7 calls over 2 months) with mailing of smoking cessation medications as clinically indicated. Additional calls were placed over a 12‐month period at the discretion of the counselor Control: participants were mailed self‐help materials and had continued access to clinical smoking cessation services through their Veterans Affairs Medical Center. All of these had referral‐based smoking cessation programs. Program structure varied by site (e.g., number of sessions and group or individual therapy). However, nicotine patches, nicotine gum, and slow‐release bupropion were available at all sites
Outcomes	6m sustained abstinence at 12m Validation: None Measures of provider implementation: Assist‐Meds, Arrange
Funding Source	Department of Veterans Affairs Health Services Research and Development Service grant SUI 99101‐1
Author's declarations of interest	Authors declared that they had no financial conflict of interest.
Notes	Strategy: Adjunctive counseling Level: Patient Comparison type: Single component vs. standard care
Risk of bias
Bias	Authors' judgement	Support for judgement
Sequence Generation	Low risk	Computer‐generated randomization scheme stratified by primary care facility and blocked within sites
Allocation concealment	Low risk	Computer‐generated
Blinding of outcome assessors All outcomes	High risk	Smoking status was self‐reported. Intervention group had greater face‐to‐face contact.
Incomplete outcome data All outcomes	Low risk	The overall loss to follow‐up was 14.6% (n = 122/838); 13.9% (n = 58/418) in the intervention group and 15.2% (n = 64/420) in the control group were lost to follow‐up at 12 months