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Hindi Research Article
Pattern of Tobacco Consumption and Influencing Factors among Male School Children in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
Ahmed Mandil1*, Abdulaziz BinSaeed1, Shaffi Ahmad1, Mohammad Yamani2, Nouf Turki1, Mohammad Al-Enzi3, Mohammad Abdul-Karim3, Rakan Al-Hamad3Hussam Alnowaiser31Department of Family & Community Medicine, College of Medicine, Saudi Arabia
2Department of Clinical Pharmacy, College of Pharmacy, Saudi Arabia
3College of Medicine King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia
- Corresponding Author:
- Ahmed Mandil
Department of Family & Community Medicine
College of Medicine
King Saud University (seconded from the High Institute of Public Health
University of Alexandria), Saudi Arabia
Tel: + (9661) 467 9860
Fax: + (9661) 467 1967
E-mail: ahmed.mandil@yahoo.com
Received date: April 19, 2014; Accepted date: September 09, 2014; Published date: September 12, 2014
Citation: Mandil A, BinSaeed A, Ahmad S, Yamani M, Turkil N et al. (2014) Pattern of Tobacco Consumption and Influencing Factors among Male School Children in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. J Addict Res Ther 5:192. doi:10.4172/2155-6105.1000192
Copyright: © 2014 Mandil A, et al. This is an open-access article distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original author and source are credited.
Abstract
This study aimed at studying tobacco consumption patterns among male school children in Riyadh. Methods: A cross-sectional survey was carried out on 5961 male school children, using a modified WHO-GYTS questionnaire. Results: Smoking data was available for 4693(83%) children, among whom 483(10.3%; 95% CI:9.4-11.2%) reported being “current smokers”. Logistic regression reflected independent risk factors for tobacco use to include: educational stage (OR=3.1-4.4 for high school), school type (OR=6.2 for governmental-general compared to private schools), smoking household member (father / mother / brother / friends) (OR=1.5–25.7). Recommendations: Raising awareness of children is important for saving them from taking up the habit and assisting smokers to quit. The school health team should be playing important dual roles: directly for children and indirectly through empowering their teachers in combating tobacco use campaigns. Male school children are mostly affected by their peers, fathers and brothers. Thus, parents and siblings should be role models for their children / siblings, respectively, by not smoking themselves.
