Physical Therapists’Awareness and Roles in Tobacco Control

Abstract

This survey study aims to describe physical therapists’ awareness and
roles in tobacco control and evaluate their knowledge about tobacco and
counseling for smoking cessation. The samples were 309 physical therapists
who attended 4 physical therapy conferences (between 2012 and 2013). Data
was collected by self-reporting questionnaire and analyzed using descriptive
statistics. The results showed that majority of physical therapists (66.66%) were
aware of participating in tobacco control at high to very high level. Most
physical therapists (66.02%) had roles in tobacco control. The most frequent
role was advising smokers to quit smoking. The least frequent roles were
assessing smoking addiction level and referring smokers to smoking cessation
clinics. The main barrier in participating tobacco control was the lack of
knowledge and skills in counseling for smoking cessation. The findings of this
study suggest that physical therapists need more knowledge and skills in
counseling for smoking cessation and should be encouraged to have more
roles in referring smokers to cessation clinics.