The 131st Annual Meeting (November 15-19, 2003) of APHA

Abstract #57988

Emel Irgil, Bilgin Halil, Sezai Arslan, and Nurgun Durali. School of Medicine Department of Public Health, Uludag University, Gorukle campus, Bursa, 16059, Turkey, +90 224 442 8200, eirgil@uludag.edu.tr

^{In Turkey, 17 million people smoke and every year 100000 people die of tobacco and its products. After the restrictive law about tobacco products in Turkey, the adolescents became the target population and education and counseling have been given them with great effort since 1996. The purpose of the study was to assess the prevalence of smoking and the nicotine dependence among last-year medical students, Uludag University, Bursa, Turkey. Of totally 241 last-year medical students, 95 (39.4 %) smoke. Only 80 (33.2 %) of them never smoke. Sixty-one (25.3) of them have tried to smoke at least once in their lives and 5 (2.1%) students quit. Male students smoke more than female students (c2: 5.29, p<0.05). However, after comparing the average scores of the Fagerstrom Test for Nicotine Dependence by gender, the difference is not found statistically significant (t: 1.19, p>0.05). The average smoking time is 5.3±2.4 years and the mean beginning age is 18.7±2.3 years. The beginning reason of them was “stress” (n:52, 54.7%). Seventy-nine of them (83.2 %) smoke less or equal to 20 cigarettes/day. Existence of a smoking person in the family do not have influence on the smoking habits of the students (c2: 2.19, p>0.05). There should be a continuing education especially for university students against the number-one-killing factor – tobacco. In order to be a good model for public and the patients young medical doctors should smoke less.}

Learning Objectives:

• At the end of this session, learners will be able to; 1- understand the prevalence of smoking among last-year medical students of a developing country,
• 2- understand the concept of nicotine dependence.

Keywords: Smoking,

Presenting author's disclosure statement:
I do not have any significant financial interest/arrangement or affiliation with any organization/institution whose products or services are being discussed in this session.