Open AccessSmoking patterns among primary health care attendees, Al-Qassim region, Saudi Arabia
Author(s) -
N. S. Al Haddad,
T. A. Al Habeeb,
M. H. Abdel Gadir,
Y. S. Al Ghamdy,
N. A. Qureshi
Publication year - 2003
Publication title -
eastern mediterranean health journal/eastern mediterranean health journal
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.442
H-Index - 47
eISSN - 1687-1634
pISSN - 1020-3397
DOI - 10.26719/2003.9.5-6.911
Subject(s) - medicine , primary health care , primary care , family medicine , peer pressure , smoking cessation , nicotine , cigarette smoking , environmental health , psychiatry , population , psychology , social psychology , pathology
Prevalence, sociodemographic patterns and medical co-morbidity of smoking among a cross-section of primary health care [PHC] clients in Saudi Arabia were examined. We used a 44-item semistructured questionnaire to collect data from 1752 patients at 25 randomly selected PHC centres. Percentage of smoking was 52.3%. Although 85% were adult smokers, 8.6% began smoking before age 12. Smokers gave overlapping reasons to smoke including peer pressure; non-smokers gave religious and health logics against smoking. Of all smokers, 92.8% wanted to learn cessation strategies, 11.8% were ignorant of hazards and 32.4% reported manifestations of nicotine withdrawal. Besides alcohol use [13.4%], 81.8% had co-morbid physical disease