Perceptions of blindness related to smoking: a hospital-based cross-sectional study

Abstract

Aims Smoking is associated with several serious eye diseases. Awareness of smoking and blindness, and its potential to act, as a stimulus to assist stopping smoking has not been investigated. Methods A cross-sectional survey using a structured interview of adult patients attending district general hospital ophthalmology, general surgery, and orthopaedic clinics. The interview investigated the awareness and fear of blindness for three established smokingrelated diseases, and a distractor condition (deafness), and the likelihood that smokers would quit on developing early signs of each condition. Results Response was 89.1% (358/402). In all, 183 (51.1%) of responders were male and 175 (48.9%) female. Only 9.5% of patients believed that smoking was definitely or probably a cause of blindness, compared with 92.2% for lung cancer, 87.6% for heart disease, and 70.6% for stroke. Patients ranked their fear of each of the five conditions, scoring five for the most feared and one for the least feared. Patients were significantly (Po0.01) less fearful of blindness (mean score 2.80) than lung cancer (3.89), heart disease (3.58), and stroke (3.35). About one-half of smokers stated that they would definitely or probably quit smoking if they developed early signs of blindness or the three established smokingrelated conditions, with no significant differences in proportions for these four conditions. Conclusion The findings suggest that awareness of the risk of blindness from smoking is low, but that the fear of blindness is as compelling a motivation to quit as fear of lung cancer, heart disease, and stroke. The link between smoking and eye disease should be publicised to help reduce smoking prevalence. Eye (2005) 19, 945-948.

Awareness of blindness and other smoking-related diseases and its impact on motivation for smoking cessation in eye patients

“…Our study in an Asian population yielded results similar to that of Bidwell et al 4 and Moradi et al; 5 in that the motivation score to quit smoking due to irreversible central blindness was the second highest among all the conditions examined, following only lung cancer. Hence, despite a low level of awareness, blindness is still a significant motivational factor for smoking cessation.…”

“…A hospital-based cross-sectional survey of patients in the United Kingdom revealed that only 9.5% of patients believed that smoking was definitely or probably a cause of blindness, compared with 70.6 to 92.2% for stroke, heart disease and lung cancer. 4 A survey of teenagers aged from 16 to 18 years in the United Kingdom yielded similar results. 5 However, despite the low level of awareness of smoking-related blindness found in these studies, the fear of blindness was as compelling a motivation for smoking cessation, if not more, as the fear of lung cancer, heart disease, and stroke.…”

“…5 However, despite the low level of awareness of smoking-related blindness found in these studies, the fear of blindness was as compelling a motivation for smoking cessation, if not more, as the fear of lung cancer, heart disease, and stroke. 4,5 As such, data on the level of awareness of smokingrelated blindness and its value as a motivational factor for smoking cessation is of significant public health importance. Current smokers who also have ocular diseases are a particularly vulnerable group.…”

“…Our study and others 4,5,7,13 suggest that attempts should be made to highlight blindness as a smokingrelated disease as part of anti-smoking public health education. The use of graphic health warning labels on cigarette packets is one potential way to increase the awareness of the association between blindness and smoking.…”

Can genetic risk information for age-related macular degeneration influence motivation to stop smoking? A pilot study

“…Older participants were less likely to try quitting and less likely to attend a smokers' quit session. Knowledge of the link between smoking and eye disease (46.9%) is much higher than previous studies which found 9% of the UK adult 28 and 5% of the teenage population 29 were aware of the link. A survey from Singapore found only 7.3% of their population knew of the link.…”