Prevalence and Treatment of Tobacco Use among Patients Being Treated for Mental Disorders

Abstract

Background: People with mental disorders use tobacco as a strategy for coping with various symptoms and the side effects of prescribed medications. In addition to being harmful to their health, tobacco use also interferes with their treatment process. Objective: To examine tobacco use among patients being treated for mental disorders in a public health system in a Brazilian the city. Methods: were interviewed 362 patients being treated by the specialized services for mental health. The participants included persons who met the diagnostic criteria for schizophrenia, schizotypal, and delusional disorders, mood (affective) disorders, or neurotic, stress-related, and somatoform disorders. Results: The median age of participants was 46.4 years, of which 73.5% were women and 42.5% were unmarried, 37.8% smokers. Among the smokers, 82% claimed they wanted to quit smoking, and 49% made daily visits to the health center. 79.6% of the participants had tried to quit smoking previously, and of these, 84.3% had tried to do so on their own. Conclusion: Tobacco use is an important factor to be considered in developing treatment plans for people with mental disorders. It is necessary to develop strategies to help people quit smoking and train health professionals to incorporate these strategies into the treatment process.

Keywords

• smoking
• mental health
• co-occuring disorders
• tobacco use