Impact of Village-based Health Education of Tobacco Control on the Current Smoking Rate in Chinese Rural Areas

• Published in: Journal of Huazhong University of Science and Technology. Medical sciences 2016-02, Vol.36 (1), p.150-152
• Main Author: 王坚苗 熊维宁 谢俊刚 刘先胜 赵建平 张珍祥 徐永健
• Format: Article
• Language: English
• Subjects: Adolescent; Adult; Case-Control Studies; China; Delivery of Health Care - methods; Health Education - methods; Humans; Male; Medicine; Medicine & Public Health; Middle Aged; Rural Population; Smoking Prevention; Tobacco Use Cessation; 健康教育; 农村地区; 卫生; 吸烟率; 基线调查; 对照组; 问卷调查; 随机分配
• ISSN: 1672-0733; 1993-1352
• DOI: 10.1007/s11596-016-1558-y

The number of smokers in Chinese rural areas is more than 200 million, which is twice that in cities. It is very significant to carry out tobacco control interventions in rural areas. We performed this community intervention study to evaluate the efficacy of village-based health education of tobacco control on the male current smoking rate in rural areas. The population of this study was the males above 15 years old from 6 villages in rural areas. The villages were randomly assigned to intervention group or control group（3 villages in each group）. Self-designed smoking questionnaire was applied. The intervention group received the village-based health education of tobacco control for one year. The primary outcome measurement was the male current smoking rate. In the baseline investigation, completed surveys were returned by 814 male residents from the control group and 831 male residents from the intervention group. The male current smoking rate in the control group and the intervention group was 61.2% and 58.5%, respectively, before intervention. There was no significant difference between these two groups（P〉0.05）. After one-year intervention, the current smoking rate in the intervention group（51.2%） was significantly lower than that in the control group（62.8%）（P〈0.001）. Our study suggested that the village-based health education of tobacco control was effective in lowering the male current smoking rate in rural areas, which could be a suitable and feasible way for tobacco control in the Chinese rural areas.