E - cigarette: knowledge, attitude and practice among the students and staff of king saud bin abdulaziz university for health sciences, saudi arabia

Background: E-cigarettes designed to vaporize a liquid solution of propylene glycol and/or vegetable glycerin in which nicotine or other aromas may be dissolvedis a pharmacologically active biomolecule that is known to cause addiction. Despite the country’s efforts to combat use, electronic cigarettes are still gaining popularity in the community, especially among college students, which makes it necessary to conduct studies to assess the prevalence of this phenomenon in the Saudi community, and to assess the awareness, attitude and practice towards the dangers of those devices, particularly after the latest health concerns raised by the CDC. The present study was conducted to assess the awareness, knowledge and practice of e-cigarettes among the teaching and non-teaching members of King Saud Bin AbdulAziz University for health sciences across the three regions of Saudi Arabia i.e. Al Ahsa, Riyadh and Jeddah.
Material and Methods: It was a cross sectional study. All the students, teaching and non-teaching staff of KSAU-HS across the three campuses Al Ahsa, Jeddah and Riyadh were the inclusion criteria of the study. The calculated sample size was found to be 377.Stratified random sampling technique was used to select participants. The data were collected using a self-administered pretested and validated questionnaire which was distributed online through Google Form. The data were entered and analyzed by using the SPSS, version 21 .Descriptive statistics were presented using counts, proportions (%), mean ± standard deviation whenever appropriate. The comparison of the knowledge, attitude towards e cigarettes between demographic characteristics was performed by using chi square test. A p-value cut off point of 0.05 at 95% CI was used to determine statistical significance.
Results: A total of 377 subjects participated in this study. The mean age of the participants was 28.81 years ± 9.28 Std. Dev. More than 60% (N=229) of the participants were male. The mean knowledge score on e-cigarette smoking among the participants who were aware of e-cigarettes was 2.87 ± 0.93 Std. Dev. Two thirds of them (75.1%) had poor knowledge about the content, use, health hazards, addiction and means of regular smoking cessation of e-cigarettes. Good knowledge about e- cigarette was significantly more among the male than the female (P- 0.001), urban participants than the rural ones (P=002) and among the e-cigarettes user (P=0.000).The mean attitude score of the participants was 3.25±0.90 Std. Dev. Out of the total participants who were aware of e-cigarettes, majority of them (56.2%) had poor attitude towards e-cigarette smoking. The positive attitude towards e-cigarette was maximum among those who were conventional smoker (P=0.018). More than fifty one percent had tried e-cigarettes or vaping device. Thirty three percent of the participants considered it a good way to quit or cut down on smoking,30.6 % considered it cheaper than the traditional while 30.1% considered it less harmful than the traditional cigarettes and 20.2 % used it by their own desire. Twelve percent s used e-cigarettes because they thought that it can be used in places where smoking is prohibited and only 7.1 % used it with the aim of quitting smoking.
Conclusion: The present study has shown a poor knowledge of e-cigarette among the students and faculty members of KSAU-HS across the three campuses. Majority of participants in this study also had poor attitude towards e-cigarette. As far as practice towards e-cigarette smoking is concerned majority of them practiced smoking e-cigarette and considered it as a good way to quit or cut down on smoking. It is recommended to conduct an educational and counseling programme to increase more awareness towards e-cigarette smoking, its harm of use specially to enhance their positive attitude towards e-cigarette smoking.