IDEAS home Printed from https://ideas.repec.org/a/gam/jijerp/v10y2013i6p2185-2197d26083.html
   My bibliography  Save this article

Tobacco Use and Nicotine Dependence among Conflict-Affected Men in the Republic of Georgia

Author

Listed:
  • Bayard Roberts

    (European Centre on Health of Societies in Transition, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, 15-17 Tavistock Place, London WC1H 9SH, UK)

  • Ivdity Chikovani

    (Curatio International Foundations, Tbilisi 0162, Georgia)

  • Nino Makhashvili

    (Global Initiative on Psychiatry, Tbilisi 0162, Georgia
    Ilia State University, Tbilisi 0162, Georgia)

  • Vikram Patel

    (Centre for Global Mental Health, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, 15-17 Tavistock Place, London WC1H 9SH, UK)

  • Martin McKee

    (European Centre on Health of Societies in Transition, London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine, 15-17 Tavistock Place, London WC1H 9SH, UK)

Abstract

Background : There is very little evidence globally on tobacco use and nicotine dependence among civilian populations affected by armed conflict, despite key vulnerability factors related to elevated mental disorders and socio-economic stressors. The study aim was to describe patterns of smoking and nicotine dependence among conflict-affected civilian men in the Republic of Georgia and associations with mental disorders. Methods : A cross-sectional household survey using multistage random sampling was conducted in late 2011 among conflict-affected populations in Georgia. Respondents included in this paper were 1,248 men aged ≥18 years who were internally displaced persons (IDPs) and former IDPs who had returned in their home areas. Outcomes of current tobacco use, heavy use (≥20 cigarettes per day), and nicotine dependence (using the Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence) were used. PTSD, depression, anxiety and hazardous alcohol use were also measured, along with exposure to traumatic events and a range of demographic and socio-economic characteristics. Results : Of 1,248 men, 592 (47.4%) smoked and 70.9% of current smokers were heavy smokers. The mean nicotine dependence score was 5.0 and the proportion with high nicotine dependence (≥6) was 41.4%. In multivariate regression analyses, nicotine dependence was significantly associated with PTSD (β 0.74) and depression (β 0.85), along with older age (except 65+ years), and being a returnee (compared to IDPs). Conclusions : The study reveals very high levels of heavy smoking and nicotine dependence among conflict-affected persons in Georgia. The associations between nicotine dependence, PTSD and depression suggest interventions could yield synergistic benefits.

Suggested Citation

  • Bayard Roberts & Ivdity Chikovani & Nino Makhashvili & Vikram Patel & Martin McKee, 2013. "Tobacco Use and Nicotine Dependence among Conflict-Affected Men in the Republic of Georgia," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 10(6), pages 1-13, May.
    • Handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:10:y:2013:i:6:p:2185-2197:d:26083
    as

    Download full text from publisher

    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/10/6/2185/pdf
    Download Restriction: no
    File URL: https://www.mdpi.com/1660-4601/10/6/2185/
    Download Restriction: no
    ---><---

    References listed on IDEAS

    as
    1. Milos Maksimovic & Dusan Backovic & Jadranka Maksimovic & Radojka Kocijancic, 2011. "Socio-economic status and psychosocial functioning of internally displaced adolescents and adolescents from Belgrade," International Journal of Public Health, Springer;Swiss School of Public Health (SSPH+), vol. 56(3), pages 305-310, June.
    Full references (including those not matched with items on IDEAS)

    Citations

    Citations are extracted by the CitEc Project, subscribe to its RSS feed for this item.
    as


    Cited by:

    1. Mohammed Merzah & Zsigmond Kósa & János Sándor & Shewaye Natae & Péter Pikó & Róza Ádány & Szilvia Fiatal, 2021. "Roma Socioeconomic Status Has a Higher Impact on Smoking Behaviour than Genetic Susceptibility," IJERPH, MDPI, vol. 18(6), pages 1-12, March.

    Most related items

    These are the items that most often cite the same works as this one and are cited by the same works as this one.
    1. Butler, A. & Haynes, R.D. & Humphries, T.D. & Ranjan, P., 2014. "Efficient optimization of the likelihood function in Gaussian process modelling," Computational Statistics & Data Analysis, Elsevier, vol. 73(C), pages 40-52.

    Corrections

    All material on this site has been provided by the respective publishers and authors. You can help correct errors and omissions. When requesting a correction, please mention this item's handle: RePEc:gam:jijerp:v:10:y:2013:i:6:p:2185-2197:d:26083. See general information about how to correct material in RePEc.

    If you have authored this item and are not yet registered with RePEc, we encourage you to do it here. This allows to link your profile to this item. It also allows you to accept potential citations to this item that we are uncertain about.

    If CitEc recognized a bibliographic reference but did not link an item in RePEc to it, you can help with this form .

    If you know of missing items citing this one, you can help us creating those links by adding the relevant references in the same way as above, for each refering item. If you are a registered author of this item, you may also want to check the "citations" tab in your RePEc Author Service profile, as there may be some citations waiting for confirmation.

    For technical questions regarding this item, or to correct its authors, title, abstract, bibliographic or download information, contact: MDPI Indexing Manager (email available below). General contact details of provider: https://www.mdpi.com .

    Please note that corrections may take a couple of weeks to filter through the various RePEc services.

    IDEAS is a RePEc service. RePEc uses bibliographic data supplied by the respective publishers.