title: Smoking among undergraduate health sciences students: prevalence and knowledge.
abstract: OBJECTIVE
  To determine the prevalence of smoking and the level of knowledge about smoking among undergraduate health sciences students.
  
  
  METHODS
  This was a cross-sectional study. A self-administered structured questionnaire was completed in the classroom by senior undergraduate health sciences students in the cities of Cuiabá and Várzea Grande, Brazil. We evaluated students at one public university and two private universities. Five variables were studied: age, gender, type of course, smoking status, and knowledge about smoking. The knowledge variable was divided into five parts: smoking as a disease; smoking/nicotine as a cause of dependence; specific education on smoking; major obstacles to the success of smoking cessation; and forms of smoking treatment. Only the medical students responded to questions related to the last two items.
  
  
  RESULTS
  The prevalence of smoking ranged from 9.3% at the public university to 21.1% at one of the two private universities. Approximately 30% of the respondents were unable to identify nicotine as the cause of dependence, 20.8% did not consider smoking a disease, and 47.2% reported that they had never received any instruction on the topic of smoking. The medical students enrolled at the public university showed the highest level of knowledge regarding the various forms of smoking treatment.
  
  
  CONCLUSIONS
  The prevalence of smoking among the university students in our sample was high. Their knowledge about smoking was insufficient, which suggests inadequacy of the curricula at these universities.
authors.affiliation: Universidade Federal de Mato Grosso, UFMT, Federal University of Mato Grosso, Cuiabá, MT, Brasil. fbotelho@terra.com.br
authors.forename: Clovis
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Botelho
authors.forename: Ana Maura Pereira da
authors.initials: AM
authors.lastname: Silva
authors.forename: Claudia Duarte
authors.initials: CD
authors.lastname: Melo
mesh_terms: D000328:Adult; D001938:Brazil / Q000453:epidemiology; D003430:Cross-Sectional Studies; D005260:Female; D007722:Health Knowledge, Attitudes, Practice; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D015995:Prevalence; D017149:Private Sector / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D017150:Public Sector / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D012907:Smoking / Q000453:epidemiology*; D013336:Students, Health Occupations / Q000523:psychology / Q000706:statistics & numerical data*