State-of-the-Art Interventions for Office-Based Parental Tobacco Control

Abstract

Parental tobacco use is a serious health issue for all family members. Child health care clinicians are in a unique and important position to address parental smoking because of the regular, multiple contacts with parents and the harmful health consequences to their patients. This article synthesizes the current evidence-based interventions for treatment of adults and applies them to the problem of addressing parental smoking in the context of the child health care setting. Brief interventions are effective, and complementary strategies such as quitlines will improve the chances of parental smoking cessation. Adopting the 5 A's framework strategy (ask, advise, assess, assist, and arrange) gives each parent the maximum chance of quitting. Within this framework, specific recommendations are made for child health care settings and clinicians. Ongoing research will help determine how best to implement parental smoking-cessation strategies more widely in a variety of child health care settings.

Smoking practices and risk awareness in parents regarding passive smoke exposure of their preschool children: A cross-sectional study in Tehran

“…[6] In our study, there was no difference in the rate of smokers in families with one or more children. We did not Þ nd a comparative study during our literature search.…”

“…Some reports state that a signiÞ cant number of parents remain unaware of the detrimental effects of smoking on their children's health; [6] however, almost all subjects in our study were aware that passive smoking was harmful to their children, while 25% thought it was extremely harmful and may cause death. Studies have revealed that risk awareness seems to have insigniÞ cant effect on smoking behavior, a fact that was reiterated in our study as well.…”

“…[9] According to statistical reports, about 1 in 3 US children live with a smoker; estimates of child exposure to secondhand smoke range from 25% to 43% of all children in the United States. [6,11] Questionnaire-based assessment of environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) exposure has varied from 7% in Finnish children to >60% among Californian youth. [7] A survey in Greece revealed smoking prevalence among adults with preschool children to be 44% (52% of fathers and 36% of mothers).…”

“…[13,19,20] Reports suggest that smoking remains concentrated among the poor and less well educated, precisely the families who can least afford the Þ nancial burden. [6,13] A study from Iran identified poverty as one of the most common reasons for cigarette smoking in young people. [10] We observed that in our subjects, frequency of smoking parents was signiÞ cantly lower in families with high social status in comparison to households with low socioeconomic circumstances.…”

“…[5] It has been observed that adopting the framework strategy of 5 A's (ask, advise, assess, assist, and arrange) gives each parent the maximum chance of quitting. [6] However, before implementing an effective course of action, the counselor needs background knowledge about socio-demographic patterns and smoking habits of parents, as well as their attitudes towards the dangers of tobacco smoke. Questionnaires are relatively inexpensive and allow exposure assessment during different periods and in different indoor environments and hence are commonly used for assessing exposure to SHS in health-effects studies.…”