title: Understanding the relationship between socioeconomic status, smoking cessation services provided by the health system and smoking cessation behavior in Brazil.
abstract: Increasing the effectiveness of smoking cessation policies requires greater consideration of the cultural and socioeconomic complexities of smoking. The purpose of this paper is to explore the association between socioeconomic status and "selected midpoints" linked to smoking cessation in Brazil. Data was collected from a representative sample of urban adult smokers as part of the ITC-Brazil Survey (2009, N = 1,215). After controlling for age and gender, there were no statistically significant differences quit attempts in the last six months between individuals with different socioeconomic status. However, smokers with high socioeconomic status visited a doctor 1.54 times more often than those with low socioeconomic status (p-value = 0.017), and were also 1.65 times more likely to receive advice to quit smoking (p-value = 0.025). Our results demonstrate that disparities in health and socioeconomic status are still a major challenge for policymakers to increase the population impact of tobacco control actions worldwide.
authors.affiliation: Divisão de Epidemiologia, Instituto Nacional de Câncer, Rio de Janeiro, Brasil. andreszk@hotmail.com
authors.forename: André Salem
authors.initials: AS
authors.lastname: Szklo
authors.forename: James F
authors.initials: JF
authors.lastname: Thrasher
authors.forename: Cristina
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Perez
authors.forename: Valeska Carvalho
authors.initials: VC
authors.lastname: Figueiredo
authors.forename: Geoffrey
authors.initials: G
authors.lastname: Fong
authors.forename: Liz Maria de
authors.initials: LM
authors.lastname: Almeida
mesh_terms: D000293:Adolescent; D000328:Adult; D001938:Brazil / Q000453:epidemiology; D005260:Female; D006291:Health Policy; D006297:Health Services Accessibility; D006801:Humans; D008297:Male; D008875:Middle Aged; D011159:Population Surveillance; D015995:Prevalence; D012907:Smoking / Q000453:epidemiology / Q000523:psychology; D016540:Smoking Cessation / Q000191:economics / Q000706:statistics & numerical data; D000074606:Smoking Prevention; D012959:Socioeconomic Factors; D055815:Young Adult