World Health Organization Collaborating Centre for Smoking Cessation and Treatment of Tobacco Dependence

Best Practices of Smoking Cessation in the Western Pacific Region

Questionnaire

1. Country / Region

Mongolia

Programme background

2. Name of Programme / Service

Addiction program

3. What was/ were the objective(s) of the programme / service (e.g. triggering quit attempt, promoting new activity, provision of cessation services)?

Overall purpose of the Addiction program is to provide psychological, pharmacological and other medical services to people with substance use disorders or people with drug, tobacco and alcohol addiction.

4. What was the duration / time period of the programme / service?

The addiction program is one of the core programs being implemented at the National Center for Mental Health since 1970s.

5. What was the target population?

Key target population is people with addiction disorders and their family members and caregivers.

Programme details

6. Please briefly describe the activity(-ies) carried out under the programme / service (e.g. provision of smoking cessation services, campaign to promote/enhance cessation services provision).

Under the Addiction program, a range of training activities, information, education and communication campaigns are organized annually. The Addiction program specialists also provide professional and methodological support and guidance to healthcare workers at primary and secondary level healthcare facilities in provinces and districts.

7. What were the factors that contributed to the programme / service establishment?

Over the years, substance use disorders have been a priority as part of mental health program in Mongolia. Hence, the Addiction program has been implemented at the National Center for Mental Health, as one of its core programs.

Attempts to quit smoking is high among the population, but percentage of quitting is low, according to the national STEP survey on the prevalence of NCDs and injury risk factors 2005, 2009, 2023, 2019 in Mongolia.

8. Did the programme / service involve other organisation(s) (e.g. non-governmental organisation, professional association, academia)? What were their roles?

The addiction program involves relevant government and non-government agencies, Mongolian National University of Medical Sciences, and healthcare facilities of all 3 levels.

9. Please briefly describe the resource implications for this programme / service:

i.	How was / were necessary funding and / or manpower secured?
	The Addiction program is funded by the state budget, with little of insufficient resources contribution of health promotion foundation and health insurance.
ii.	Please briefly describe any use of information technology to implement or facilitate the programme / service
	The NCMH operates a 24-hour Hotline 18002000 for overall mental health counselling. The Center plans to adapt and introduce WHO mCessation application for smoking cessation.
iii.	Any other special resource required to implement the programme / service?
	Stable and adequate human resources has been very important yet challenging issue to implement the program.

10. COVID-19

i.	Please briefly describe any difficulties encountered during the programme / service implementation amid COVID-19.
	During the COVID-19 pandemic, the addiction program was disrupted, though not completely stopped, due to repurposing and deployment of the Center’s staff for various functions of COVID-19 response and management.
ii.	How did you overcome them?
	As mental health and psychosocial support was a part of COVID-19 response and management, the NCMH managed to provide its psychological, pharmacological and other medical services to people with substance use disorders.

Programme evaluation

11. Was there any evaluation of the programme / service (e.g. quantitative survey, qualitative interview, etc.) conducted?

The NCMH has its internal monitoring and evaluation mechanism for the program.

12. What was the impact of the programme / services (e.g. number of smokers who quit)?

A situational analysis on tobacco cessation and tobacco dependence treatment was conducted in Mongolia, with the support of WHO WPRO. One of the recommendations was to develop and implement a dedicated smoking cessation program. Therefore, under the guidance of the Ministry of Health, the NCMH specialists developed a national guidelines for tobacco cessation and tobacco dependence treatment and the developed guidelines is currently under review and approval at the MOH.