Introduction:

the impact of passive smoking is underestimated, not only by families but also by society at large. We present the results of a survey of parents conducted in the paediatric clinics of our catchment area over 3 weeks. We describe and analyse the findings of the survey.

Material and methods:

we conducted a cross-sectional, observational and descriptive study over 3 weeks between May 27-31, 2019 including the “Week without smoke” and the weeks 2 weeks before and 2 weeks after.

Results:

72.26% of the parents reported not smoking. In the group of nonsmokers, 68.72% had never smoked. The mean age at initiation of smoking was 17.04 years, with a range of 10 to 38 years. Of all smoking parents, 76.54% had considered quitting. In addition, 77.78% of the smoking parents considered that having a child could influence the decision to quit smoking. The results were similar in the 3 weeks that data were collected.

Conclusions:

most of the parents surveyed did not smoke, and most of the nonsmokers had never smoked. We ought to highlight the early age at which participants started to smoke and that most smokers had never contemplated quitting, as well as the fact that most considered that having a child would influence that decision. Effective interventions are needed to reduce early exposure to tobacco smoke and to improve child health and therefore adult health.

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