Implementing smoking hygiene policies in household with infants exposed to secondhand smoke: intervention targeted at non-smoking mothers

OBJECTIVE: To assess the effectiveness of an intervention to motivate non-smoking mothers to reduce their infants’ exposure to second hand smoke (SHS) at home. METHODS: A total of 208 Chinese families with non-smoking mother, smoking father and infant living together in the same household, and attended a maternal and child health center were recruited in a randomized controlled trial, aiming to evaluate the effectiveness of a multi-step family smoking cessation intervention delivered onsite by a nurse smoking cessation counselor. As part of the intervention, the mothers were given guidelines and were motivated to implement the household no-smoking policy. RESULTS: At baseline, the mothers reported having taken some steps such as taking the infants away from the smoke stream (69%) and opening the windows (68%). About 90% of the mothers perceived no difficulties in the execution of household no-smoking policy and expressed willingness to execute such policy. At 6 month follow up, about 37% of the intervention mothers have executed at least one nosmoking policy compared to the control (27%). The most popular policy executed were asking a smoker not to smoke within 3 meters’ vicinity of the infants (Intervention: 33% vs. Control: 21%) and to extinguish all cigarettes before entering home (Intervention: 28% vs. Control: 17%). Nevertheless, no significant difference was found between the intervention and control group on the mothers’ execution of household no smoking policy. CONCLUSION: While non-smoking mothers may have positive attitudes towards providing a smoke-free home for their infants, they may have faced difficulties in implementing a household no-smoking policy in real life. Preliminary evidence suggested that a one time intervention could be a first step to motivate mothers to protect their infants from SHS exposure at home, and further studies is desired to test an improved intervention recognizing the difficulties of executing such policy at home, and with a larger sample size to confirm its effectiveness. Funding: CRCG/HKU