M. Kawakami et al., RELATION BETWEEN SMOKING STATUS OF PHYSICIANS AND THEIR ENTHUSIASM TOOFFER SMOKING CESSATION ADVICE, Internal medicine, 36(3), 1997, pp. 162-165
Are nonsmoking physicians more likely to give smoking cessation advice
to their patients? To determine this, we sent a questionnaire individ
ually to physicians in Tokyo, The average age of the 323 respondents w
as 59.8+/-12.9 (mean+/-SD); 84.8% of them were male and 21.1% were smo
kers, Among the respondents, 88.8% asked their patients about their sm
oking status, 79.9% advised smoking patients to stop, and 93.5% believ
ed smoking cessation interventions to be necessary, Nonsmoking physici
ans were more likely to advise patients to stop smoking (85.6%) than s
moking physicians (70.1%); the smoking physicians who themselves wishe
d to reduce cigarette consumption or stop smoking were more likely to
do so (85.0%) than those who did not wish to reduce or stop (43.5%), M
oreover, more nonsmoking physicians seriously felt that smoking cessat
ion interventions are necessary (31.2%) than did smoking physicians (6
.5%), In conclusion, the smoking status and attitude towards smoking o
f physicians influences their enthusiasm to give advice to their patie
nts against smoking.