Rethink Tobacco Indiana is a statewide initiative aimed at bringing tobacco awareness to the field of behavioral health. Our highly skilled team of trained tobacco treatment specialists are dedicated to helping behavioral health organizations integrate evidence-based tobacco treatment strategies into their continuum of care.
About Rethink Tobacco Indiana
Leadership
Debi Hudson Buckles
BS, RRT, CPAHA, NCTTP
Buckles is the tobacco control lead of the IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center’s Office of Community Outreach and Engagement. She earned a bachelor’s of science degree in respiratory therapy and a National Certification in Tobacco Treatment Practice. She is a certified UMass Chan Medical School tobacco treatment specialist trainer and serves on national organizations, including the Council for Tobacco Treatment Training Programs and the Association for the Treatment of Tobacco Use and Dependence. In addition, since 2008, Buckles has been the project director of Rethink Tobacco Indiana project, focused on tobacco cessation systems change in mental health and substance abuse centers across Indiana. During her more than 25 years in the field of tobacco treatment, she has coordinated and developed training programs for health care professionals and lay people across Indiana, worked on multiple research efforts, provided technical assistance to many different types of healthcare organizations, trained more than 300 tobacco treatment specialists, and is recognized as a leader in the state on tobacco control efforts.
Phone: 317-278-3736
E-mail: dhudson@iu.edu
Karen S. Hudmon
DrPH, MS, RPh, TTS Principal Investigator
Dr. Karen Hudmon serves as the principal investigator for the state grant that funds the work of Rethink Tobacco Indiana. She is a professor of pharmacy practice at the Purdue University College of Pharmacy and clinical professor at the University of California San Francisco School of Pharmacy. Hudmon is a licensed pharmacist with a doctorate in public health and nearly 30 years of tobacco research experience and has provided tobacco cessation training to more than 20,000 health professionals (students and licensed clinicians). She has also provided educational sessions for prescribers of numerous community mental health centers to encourage them to view tobacco dependence within their scope of practice as part of her work with Rethink Tobacco Indiana.
Hudmon has co-led the Indiana-based initiative to advance legislation enabling pharmacists to prescribe all smoking cessation medications under a statewide protocol that she authored. Further, she was one of the original authors of the Rx for Change: Clinician-Assisted Tobacco Cessation training program, which has been in existence since 1999 and is used globally to train students and licensed clinicians to apply evidence-based approaches for helping patients quit. Currently, Hudmon’s research is funded by the NIH and the Indiana State Department of Health. In addition, she is a trained tobacco treatment specialist and a certified UMass Chan Medical School tobacco treatment specialist trainer.
Email: khudmon@purdue.edu
Kristy Murphy
Kristy serves as Rethink Tobacco Indiana’s community outreach manager with the Office of Community Outreach and Engagement at the IU Simon Comprehensive Cancer Center. As a Mayo Clinic certified tobacco treatment specialist, Murphy brings more than 10 years of experience in tobacco treatment practice and program management. She holds a National Certificate in Tobacco Treatment Practice and spent most of her career working directly in patient care. In addition to helping cancer patients and patients in treatment for addiction, Murphy was also an educator and staff trainer for best practices in tobacco treatment and motivational interviewing techniques. During her career, she partnered with the the IU nicotine dependence program and Community Fairbanks Recover Center to create a continuing education course on tobacco treatment and was also a guest speaker at Franciscan Health’s Oncology Symposium. Murphy has a master’s of science degree in kinesiology from Indiana University Indianapolis, where she was a graduate teaching assistant and adjunct instructor in the Department of Kinesiology.
Email: kmcatt@iu.edu
