Tobacco use among urban residents with diagnosed major Non-communicable diseases in Bangladesh

Background Tobacco use is an important risk factor for non-communicable diseases (NCD) and 43.3% adult use tobacco on regular basis in Bangladesh. Many patients continue to use tobacco even after diagnosis of NCDs indicating lack of awareness and appropriate cessation support. Present study was done to investigate the pattern of tobacco use among NCD patients in an urban population in Dhaka city, Bangladesh. Methods A cross sectional study was done in a middle class urban population of Dhaka city in 2013. Household survey was done to collect information on demography, lifestyle, personal habits, and disease history. Information on tobacco use of all adult residents aged 25 years or more were collected from household head by a structured questionnaire. Household members having history of ischemic heart disease (IHD), stroke, hypertension and diabetes were identified and corroborated by presence of physician's record. Results In total information of 43,727 individuals was collected and data of 23,731(54.3%) respondents aged 25 and above were analyzed for the present study. Among the respondent's overall tobacco use were 29.6% (smoking 19.1%, smokeless tobacco 12.3%). Smoking and smokeless tobacco user among male were 36.9%, 8.5% and among female were 0.3%, 16.4% respectively. Among the respondents 29.7% were diagnosed case of one of the major NCDs (21.9% were hypertensive, 12.9% were diabetic, 6.4% had IHD and 2.7% had history of stroke). Among NCD patients 35.5% continued to use tobacco even after diagnosis. 35.3% hypertensive patients, 32.1% diabetic patients, 36.3% IHD patients and 34.5% stroke patients were tobacco user respectively. Conclusions Tobacco use was highly prevalent in urban male population. Large number of hypertensive, diabetic, IHD and stroke patients of urban population continue to use tobacco. Measures should be taken for control of tobacco use at population level as well as NCD patients should be intervened effectively for tobacco cessation