Volume 27, Issue 137, July 2023

The prevalence of the use of electronic smoking devices among medical students in Madinah

Fahd Yaslam Musawnaq¹, Ahmed Kamal Zoghby², Asseel Abdulrahman Al saqqaf², Nayef Abdulrhman Alblwiy², Faisal Fahad Alhejaili², Abdullah Ahmad AlQurayyan², Tammam Abdulsalam AlMaghamsi²

¹Department of Neurosurgery Medical Science, College of Medicine, Alrayan Colleges, Al-Madina Al-Munawara, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia
²College of Medicine, Medical Students, College of Medicine, Alrayan Colleges, Al-Madina Al-Munawara, Kingdom of Saudi Arabia

ABSTRACT

Background: The E-cigarette is a ground-breaking development in the tobacco industry. It was developed in a previous decade when such battery-operated gadgets were created to burn tobacco and satisfy a smoker's addiction. Objective: The purpose of this study is to determine the prevalence of e-cigarette use among Madinah Al-Munawara medical students. It will also examine how e-cigarettes help people quit traditional smoking and whether they are potentially addictive. Method: Cross-sectional study design and convenient sampling technique used in this study. The medical students of Taibah Medical College and Al-Rayan Medical College taken as the population of the study. Result: A total of 295 out of 1250 students completed an online questionnaire, 24.1% of the surveyed students used E-cigarettes, younger age, male, higher college class, those who have ≥ 1 close friend who smokes, show a significantly higher percentage of E-cigarettes use. Higher percentage of using e-cigarettes was faculty of pharmacy (37.7%) followed by laboratory (32.6%) then dentistry (19.0%) and lastly faculty of medicine (18.2%). Finally, the most common symptoms as related to e-cigarettes are cough at 67.6%, followed by headaches at 7%, dry mouth and throat at 4.2% and 21.1%, respectively. Conclusion: The results of this study suggest that e-cigarette use is more prevalent in the faculties of pharmacy and laboratory than in the faculties of medicine and dentistry. Participants in this study believed that e-cigarettes were less harmful and addictive than traditional cigarettes, and that they could help people quit smoking.

Keywords: E-cigarettes, Harmful, symptoms, Madinah, Medical student

Medical Science, 2023, 27, e301ms3138

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DOI: https://doi.org/10.54905/disssi/v27i137/e301ms3138

Published: 21 July 2023