Tobacco Use Prevalence study among Physicians and Nurses and Their Attitudes towards Tobacco Control in the Kyrgyz Republic.
Abstract
Objective: The overall objectives are to estimate the prevalence of tobacco use among Physicians and female Nurses and their attitudes towards tobacco control in Kyrgyz Republic.
Sample size and response rate: The total sample size includes 1700 Physicians and 2300 Nurses from 24 medical organisations. 85% of Physicians (41% men and 59% women) and 80% of Nurses (95% women and approximately 5% of men) participated in the survey. Analyses of data was made only among female Nurses because they included 95,4% of the participants.
1450 Physicians (593 men and 857 women) of the Kyrgyz Republic participated in this survey. 37% of participants were from Bishkek, the capital, approximately 30% from north and 33% from south regions. 504 physicians (35%) participated from other cities of Kyrgyzstan and 406 (28%) physicians from rural regions. 18,2% of respondents (hereinafter referred to as Nurses) were from Bishkek-capital of Kyrgyzstan. Other Nurses were from North (33,4%) and South (48,6%) regions.
Results: Current Prevalence of smoking of manufactured cigarettes among male Physicians aged 23-69 years is slightly higher than in the general male population with same age group and similar educational level (49% compared to 42%).
Smoking Prevalence among female physicians of Kyrgyzstan is much higher than among women of national representative sample (6% against 2%) with a similar educational level.
Smoking rate is 10 times higher than among young female Physicians in age group 25-34 years with a similar age group and educational level (11, 1% against 1%). Current smoking prevalence among Physicians lowers with the increase of the age group, the same picture is found among female Nurses.
One third of Health Professionals exposed to smoking at home, 5% of physicians (65% women, and 35% men) and 50% of Nurses - in public transport, 37% and 23% of Female Nurses were exposed to smoking by their colleagues at the workplace in medical organizations.
The high level of agreement of the Respondents (from 84% to 94%) was received to the question «Smoking is harmful to your Health”, nevertheless, the awareness of the harm of smoking in Kyrgyzstan was low. Only 6% of Physicians and 4% of nurses in Kyrgyzstan believe they have enough education to help patients give up smoking.
Conclusion: The results showed that the current smoking prevalence among male physicians in the Kyrgyz Republic aged 23-69 is slightly higher than that data of the general male population with same age group and similar educational level. Prevalence of smoking was significantly higher among female Physicians and Nurses than in general population with a similar educational level and age group.
Only a few Health Professionals felt well prepared to assist patients to quit smoking. These results indicate a need to educate Physicians and Nurses of Kyrgyz Republic to not start or quit smoking.
These data support the need to develop a program for implementation of FCTC, the national strategy for tobacco control and participation of Health Professionals of Kyrgyzstan in reducing smoking among the general population.
Citation
Public Centre for Tobacco Control, Kyrgyzstan. 60 pp.
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