Tobacco use in lung cancer (LC) patients (p) in Spain

Abstract

Background: Tobacco use, mainly as cigarette smoking, is the leading cause of lung cancer. Eighty-five percent of LC occur in smokers. Understanding the Spanish smoking habits allows the government to design health care policies against this consumption. To do so, the Grupo Espa~ nol de C ancer de Pulm on (Spanish Lung Cancer Group) made this analysis within the context of the Thoracic Tumor Registry (TTR). Methods: The TTR is an observational cohort multicenter study in Spain. The study is conducted according to the Declaration of Helsinki and approved by the institutional review board of each participating site. The registry was approved by the Spanish Drug Agency, as a non-post-authorization, non-interventional study. Results: Data have been collected from 6,600 LC from 58 different hospital sites across Spain. 12% (866 p) were non-smokers, 46% (3,039 p) were former smokers and 39% (2,611 p) were smokers. There were significant differences by gender, more women were non-smokers (37 % vs. 45% in males), meanwhile more former smokers were male (53.4% vs. 27.9% in women) (p-valor < 0.001). Significant differences were also observed in the study on the distribution of the smoking habit by year of diagnosis. In the last two years, the percentage of active smokers increased, both for the total population , as well as, for each one of the two genders separately. The increase was greater among the women and, also, the number of women who are active smokers is greater in recent years. Mean age of onset of the smoking habit was 18.2 years. Mean initiation age was less for men, 17.9 years in the men (95%CI 17.6-18.2 years) and 19.2 years in the women (95%CI 18.5-19.