Smokeless tobacco use among big ten wrestlers and selected associated factors

The use of smokeless tobacco (ST) by 234 Big Ten intercollegiate wrestlers was surveyed, with a special interest in determining their beliefs about ST health consequences and discriminators of ST use. Self-reported ST use was validated by sputum analysis of a selected team. Twenty-eight percent of the wrestlers were current, regular ST users. This is well above the national norm. Over 42% of the wrestlers had used some form of ST in the past year. Evidence indicates that three variables (prior cigarette smoking, receiving a free ST sample, and alcohol consumption) were strong discriminators of ST use.