[Tobacco use disorder prevalence among hospital workers]

In Spain, as in other countries, numerous studies on tobaccoism have been carried out. The purpose of this survey was to evaluate the prevalence of tobaccoism in a representative sample of hospital employees and its association with age, sex, profession level and attitudes.

Following a pilot study, a survey was carried out amongst a representative and random sample (n = 360) of hospital personnel, who were asked about their attitudes towards smoking, classified according to age, sex and professional level.

The total percentage of smokers was 36.4%, but no significant statistical differences were found between sex or age group. The professional levels with the highest percentage of smokers are ATS/DUE and clerks. 42.8% of non-smokers declared having smoked in the past. ATS/DUE, clerks and doctors showed the highest percentage. 40.5% of smokers declare that they were willing to give up smoking, whereas people over 50 were the most reluctant. The majority of cigarette smokers admitted that they smoke in the hospital. Most of them are intermediate smokers (10-20 cigarettes per day) and have been so for many years. The majority of former smokers gave up smoking in recent years.

These results prove that a large number of hospital employees are smokers. However, many are willing to give up the habit. We should therefore encourage these people to give up smoking and help them by different means such as: anti-smoking advice, medical advice and health education. We propose to declare hospitals as "Non-Smoking Area" as of the year 2000 which includes employees, patients and visitors, according to the WHO "Health for All." program.