Tobacco use and cardiovascular disease: a knowledge, attitude and practice study in rural Kerala.

Background: Tobacco consumption, either in smokeless form or as smoking, is reported to be responsible for major non-communicable diseases, namely, cardiovascular diseases, chronic obstructive pulmonary diseases and cancers. Whatsoever control strategy is being used, the community participation is of utmost importance, which will depend largely on the level of the knowledge in the community.

Aim: To assess the knowledge and attitude of a rural community towards the harmful effects of tobacco use.

Setting And Design: Venganoor Gram Panchayat of Thiruvananthapuram district of Kerala; cross-sectional study.

Materials And Methods: Interview schedule was used to collect the information on pre-designed and pre-tested proforma. The information recorded, included the demographic characteristics and socio-economic characteristics. The awareness regarding tobacco use and the attitude towards its non-usage was done, by putting forward, open and closed-ended questions.

Statistical Analysis: Percentages and proportions; t-test; chi-square test.

Results: The present study included 302 (64.7%) females and 165 (35.3%) males. Among the males, 44 (38.5%) were ever smokers. Though 451 (96.6%) of the subjects knew that tobacco use is harmful for health, only 101 (22.5%) of the subjects knew that it causes cardiovascular diseases. Electronic and print media were the common source of such knowledge being reported by 265 (58.7%) and 202 (44.7%) subjects, respectively.

Conclusions: The subjects were aware about the harmful effects of tobacco use. However, more efforts are needed to make them aware about the role of tobacco smoking and chewing, in causing cardiac problems.