Introduction:
Lack of smoking cessation training during the academic years negatively impact s on the quality of care offered by health care professionals. For this, the development and delivery of training programs aimed at improving the smoking cessation knowledge, skills, and attitudes of health sciences students are necessary. The aim of this study is to evaluate the effectiveness of an online training program in achieving brief intervention smoking cessation competence among health science students.

Material and Methods:
Pre-test/post-test study. A total of 851 students from seven Universities across four countries (Spain, United Kingdom, Belgium, and Portugal). completed the online training program called “Brief Intervention in Smoking Cessation”. This program consisted of five theoretical modules, five videos, and three virtual simulation cases, and was implemented between January 2020 and June 2022. Smoking cessation competency was achieved if the students obtained a scored greater than 5 (out of 10) on the knowledge test and on the overall simulation score. The knowledge acquisition was assessed by ad hoc elaborated multiple-choice test, and the attitudes and abilities by a simulation algorithm, both elaborated by experts on education and/or smoking cessation.

Results:
Overall, 86% of the participants reached smoking cessation competency. Students showed an increase of 3.5 points in their knowledge (mean pre-program 3.79 vs mean post-program 7.33). Furthermore, they obtained a mean score of 7.5 out of 10 for attitudes and skills.

Conclusions:
This innovative online training program was demonstrated effective at increasing smoking cessation competence among European health profession students.