| ORIGINAL ARTICLE |
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| Year : 2003 | Volume
: 57
| Issue : 7 | Page : 290-3 |
Smoking behaviour among arts student of a college in Mangalore, Dakshina Kannada.
BS Sajjan, J Chacko, K Asha
Department of Community Medicine, Kasturba Medical College, Mangalore, India
Correspondence Address:
B S Sajjan
Department of Community Medicine, Kasturba Medical College, Mangalore
India
PMID: 12928555
176 Arts students out of 450 students doing their under-graduation in an age range of 17 to 24 years returned a questionnaire designed to test their level of knowledge about smoking, attitude towards smoking and practice of smoking. 96.6% of the respondents were aware of the injurious nature of smoking. Potential to induce lung cancer was known by 93.2% of them, but only 34.1% knew it was a factor for GI malignancy. A higher proportion of males had good knowledge whereas females had moderate knowledge (p = 0.04). The incidence of smoking was 33.1%. A higher proportion of smokers chewed pan and consumed supari. 68.2% of smokers wished to quit smoking. Easy availability (47.7%) and influence of friends (34.1%) were the predominant reasons to smoke. Interestingly, 48% of males felt that smoking women had appeal. Anti smoking campaigns in addition to provision of information has to focus towards a change in attitude to smoking.
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