A Cross Sectional Study of Awareness Regarding Smoking and Its Adverse Health Effects among the Visitors of Tertiary Care Hospital, Western Part of Gujarat

Introduction: Smoking contributes to millions of deaths and continues to do so on. This study was done with purpose of assessing the knowledge and practices among smokers visiting to tertiary care hospital. Methodology: This was a cross sectional study done in in a tertiary care hospital, Gujarat from Aug-Nov 2021. Data were collected by preformed pretested Performa by taking informed consent from participants. Data entered and analyzed in Microsoft excel. Results: In this study, 91% participants were male, 54% between 36-50 years of age and 27% were from labor work. 82% of them were preferring bidi over cigarette. Among them 66% have started smoking in early childhood between 10-20 years of age. 57% have family history of smoking and 24% were influenced by peers for smoking initiation. 79% have tried to leave the smoking. 69% were knowing ban of smoking at public places and 72% were knowing warning signs over bidi/ cigarette packs. 90% were knowing about adverse health effects of smoking. Conclusion and recommendations: Although people are well aware of effect of smoking, they still continue to smoke. A strict implementation of the law and its regular monitoring should be done in public places to prevent public from smoking.