Medical students’ knowledge of smoking
- M B ALLEN, Chairman
- BTS Education Committee
- British Thoracic Society
- New Garden House
- 78 Hatton Garden
- London EC1N 8JR, UK
Smoking has a huge impact on health care provision, an estimated additional £1.4 billion being spent annually on smoking related diseases in Britain.1 This will continue to rise with the suggested improvements in lung cancer care2 and the estimated increased morbidity due to COPD.3 Helping people to stop smoking will clearly reduce the impact of these and other smoking related diseases, but how is this best achieved? Evidence suggests that advice and support from the primary care doctor to individuals who are contemplating stopping is the simplest and most cost effective method,2 4 5 though the newly published smoking cessation guidelines6 also describe …
