Instruments to Assess Secondhand Smoke Exposure in Large Cohorts of Never Smokers: The Smoke Scales

Maria Misailidi, Manolis N Tzatzarakis, Mathaios P Kavvalakis, Yiannis Koutedakis, Aristidis M Tsatsakis and Andreas D Flouris

PLOS ONE, 2014, vol. 9, issue 1, 1-8

Abstract: The objectives of this study were to: (i) to develop questionnaires that can identify never-smoking children and adults experiencing increased exposure to secondhand smoke (SHS+), (ii) to determine their validity against hair nicotine, and (iii) assess their reliability. A sample of 191 children (85 males; 106 females; 7–18 years) and 95 adult (23 males; 72 females; 18–62 years) never-smokers consented to hair nicotine analysis and answered a large number of questions assessing all sources of SHS. A randomly-selected 30% answered the questions again after 20–30 days. Prevalence of SHS+ in children and adults was 0.52±0.07 and 0.67±0.10, respectively (p 16.5 and >16, respectively. Significant Kappa agreement (p 0.05). Area under the curve and McNemar's Chi-square showed no pair-wise differences in sensitivity and specificity at the cutoff point between the two different days for SS-C and SS-A (p>0.05). We conclude that the SS-C and the SS-A represent valid, reliable, practical, and inexpensive instruments to identify children and adult never-smokers exposed to increased SHS. Future research should aim to further increase the validity of the two questionnaires.

Date: 2014
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:plo:pone00:0085809

DOI: 10.1371/journal.pone.0085809

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