Study of Substance Abuse by Street Children in Jaipur City, Rajasthan

Abstract

Objective: Street children are a highly mobile population and difficult to reach. They are recognized to be vulnerable to substance, physical and sexual abuse. Most of the studies on street children were conducted either in observation homes or via surveys, our objective was to conduct a study among street children of Jaipur City to assess substance abuse and the factors associated with them. Material and method: The present study was observation and the population consisted of children between 5-15 years of age living on the streets of Jaipur city. Result: In the study population three most common reasons observed for starting substance use were peer pressure, increase in confidence, and out of curiosity i.e. 31.5%, 21.2% and 19.6% respectively. Rest 10.3%, 9.8% and 4.9% were using them to feel elated, to forget sorrows and to decrease hunger respectively. Conclusion: In the present study, the overall prevalence of substance use was 46.0% & majority of them (86.4%) had family history of substance use. The most critical age for using substance was 9-13years.More than half of the children had habit of smoking cigarette/bidi (58.2%) and chewing tobacco (56.5%).