Elk Grove Village, IL—(ENEWSPF)—March 16, 2015. More than 3.6 million U.S. youth currently smoke, and 80 percent will continue to smoke into adulthood. Early intervention and education is important in reducing youth smoking rates and pediatricians are in a unique position to counsel both patients and their parents regarding smoking prevention and cessation.
A paper in the April 2015 Pediatrics, “State-of-the-Art Office-Based Interventions to Eliminate Youth Tobacco Use:The Past Decade” (published online March 16), reaffirms that questions about tobacco use for both patient and parent should be part of well-child visits. In addition to asking about tobacco use, pediatricians should address tobacco dependence by offering tobacco-cessation strategies that include quit materials, referrals to quit-lines or cessation programs, or medications as appropriate.
The authors note that more research is needed to find the most effective prevention and treatment approaches, especially given the limited time and competing priorities within each pediatric health care visit.
The American Academy of Pediatrics is an organization of 62,000 primary care pediatricians, pediatric medical subspecialists and pediatric surgical specialists dedicated to the health, safety and well-being of infants, children, adolescents and young adults.
Source: www.aap.org
