SmokefreeSGM, A Text-based Smoking Cessation Intervention for Sexual and Gender Minority Groups

The purpose of this study is to pretest the design of a text-based smoking cessation program tailored to sexual minority individuals.

Study Overview

• Status: Completed
• Conditions: Smoking Cessation
• Intervention / Treatment: Behavioral: SmokefreeSGM

• Study Type: Interventional
• Enrollment (Actual): 18
• Phase: Not Applicable

Contacts and Locations

Study Locations

• United States
  • Texas
    • Houston, Texas, United States, 77030
      • The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston

Participation Criteria

Eligibility Criteria

• Ages Eligible for Study: 18 years and older (Adult, Older Adult)
• Accepts Healthy Volunteers: No

Description

Inclusion Criteria:

• Smoke five or more cigarettes per day, has smoked at least 100 cigarettes in their lifetime and smokes everyday
• Have an interest in quitting smoking in the next 15 days
• Have a cellphone number with an unlimited short messaging service (SMS) plan
• Have US mailing and email addresses
• Positive cotinine saliva test results

Exclusion Criteria:

• Individuals who are found to have a prepaid cell phone
• Individuals who are found to have a cellphone number that does not work or is registered to someone else
• Pregnant or breastfeeding women
• Contraindication for nicotine patch
• Regular use of tobacco products other than cigarettes
• Current use of tobacco cessation medications
• Enrolled in another smoking cessation study
• Non-English speakers
• Having inadequate equipment/device (webcam, speakers, mic) for participating in telehealth sessions

Study Plan

How is the study designed?

Design Details

• Primary Purpose: Prevention
• Allocation: N/A
• Interventional Model: Single Group Assignment
• Masking: None (Open Label)

Number of Arms

1

Arms and Interventions

Participant Group / Arm

Intervention / Treatment

Other: Beta testing group

Behavioral: SmokefreeSGM; Participants will have access to a text-based smoking cessation program tailored to sexual minority individuals (SmokefreeSGM). The text-based program will be beta-tested by these participants for a period of 2 weeks before and 10 weeks after their quit date. Messages originated from the text-based smoking cessation program will be sent by a fictitious quit coach who will offer evidence-based advice on quitting smoking based on real-life experiences of sexual minority individuals.

What is the study measuring?

Primary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Perceived Usability as Assessed by the System Usability Scale (SUS)	The 10-item System Usability Scale (SUS) was used to assess the usability of the SmokefreeSGM text messaging program. Total score ranges from 0 to 100, with a higher score indicating greater acceptability and a score above 75 indicating that the program is perceived as acceptable.	1 month after quit date

Secondary Outcome Measures

Outcome Measure	Measure Description	Time Frame
Engagement as Assessed by the Number of Text Messages Sent and Received by Study Participants After Enrollment.	A participant's engagement rate was determined by dividing the total number of participant responses to the bidirectional text messages (numerator) by the total number of bidirectional text messages sent by the text-based platform (denominator). Participants who had rates ≤33.3% were classified as having low engagement, 33.3-66.6% moderate engagement, and ≥66.7% high engagement. Data are reported categorically as number of participants who have low, moderate, or high engagement.	1 month after enrollment

Collaborators and Investigators

• Sponsor: The University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston
• Collaborators: National Cancer Institute (NCI)
• Investigators: Principal Investigator: Irene Tami-Maury, DMD, MSc, DrPH, The University of Texas Health Science Center, Houston

Study record dates

Study Major Dates

• Study Start (Actual): January 5, 2022
• Primary Completion (Actual): October 5, 2022
• Study Completion (Actual): October 5, 2022

Study Registration Dates

• First Submitted: August 24, 2021
• First Submitted That Met QC Criteria: August 27, 2021
• First Posted (Actual): August 31, 2021

Study Record Updates

• Last Update Posted (Actual): July 20, 2025
• Last Update Submitted That Met QC Criteria: July 9, 2025
• Last Verified: July 1, 2025

More Information

Terms related to this study

• Keywords: LGBTQI
• Other Study ID Numbers: HSC-SPH-20-0318 (aim 2); 1K22CA237639 (U.S. NIH Grant/Contract)

Plan for Individual participant data (IPD)

• Plan to Share Individual Participant Data (IPD)?: NO

Drug and device information, study documents

• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated drug product: No
• Studies a U.S. FDA-regulated device product: No