Smoke cessation recommendations and prescriptions in hospitalised medical patients

Introduction: Half of the smoking population will develop smoking-related diseases. These can be decreased with smoke intervention. Aims: To assess smoking patterns in hospitalised medical patients and analyse physician advice, nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) prescription and referral to smoke cessation clinics. Method: In this single-centre retrospective observational study, all medical patients discharged on 15 consecutive days were recruited and interviewed using a standard questionnaire. Results: From a total of 706 patients discharged from the medical wards, 57% (n=406) were successfully interviewed: 209 males and 197 females. Their mean age was 64.5 years (SD ±17) with an age range of 16-92 years. These included 79 current smokers, 120 ex-smokers and 207 lifelong non-smokers. Mann-Whitney test analysis showed no statistical significance between age of onset of smoking and gender (p=0.072). Males smoked more cigarettes everyday (28 males, 19 females) (p Smoking cessation medications had been prescribed to 30 current smokers. 57 current smokers (72.2%) were given smoke cessation advice whilst 12 patients were prescribed NRT during the admission. Seven patients were prescribed NRT and two were referred to smoking cessation clinics on discharge. Conclusion: Most physicians gave smoke cessation advice to their patients, however few were prescribed NRT and even less were offered this treatment after discharge. Smoke cessation clinic referral remains low.