Abstract
Background
Smokeless tobacco use is the most important risk factor for oral cancer, a disease with the highest burden in South Asia Oral cancers are often preceded by pre-cancerous conditions that can be visually detected by health professionals during screening. The current study assesses the prevalence and determinants of tobacco consumption and oral cancer screening status among men in India.
Methods
The data from the National Family Health Survey 5 (2019-2021) was analyzed. All men between the ages of 15 and 54 years who participated in the survey were included in the analysis. The primary outcome variable was the consumption of any form of tobacco. The secondary outcome was oral cavity examination for oral cancer screening amongst men who consumed any form of tobacco. Binary logistic regression and Poisson regression were conducted.
Results
The total sample included 101839 men of whom 43.43% (n = 44227) consumed tobacco (any form) with higher consumption in the socially disadvantaged groups. Only 1.06% (n = 429) men reported that they had undergone oral cavity examination screening (OCES) for oral cancer. Moreover, 1.11% (n = 344) and 0.92% (n = 178) of smoking and smokeless tobacco users, respectively had undergone screening for oral cancer.
Conclusion
Only one in 100 current male tobacco users in India undergo OCES which increases their risk of progression of undetected and untreated, premalignant and malignant oral cancer lesions. Persistently high tobacco consumption and very low OCES screening warrant the need for scaling up both tobacco cessation and OCES services, especially in socioeconomically disadvantaged groups.
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Acknowledgments
We would like to express our deepest gratitude to the International Institute for Population Sciences for giving us the NFHS dataset and authorizing us to conduct the research.
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All data used in this analysis can be downloaded directly from the DHS program (after registration) at: https://dhsprogram.com/data/available-datasets.cfm.
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Conceptualisation: (SR, SG, SB); Methods: (All Authors), Software: None, Formal Analysis: (SR, SG, SB); Investigation, Resources, Data curation: None; (as secondary data); Writing- Original draft (All Authors), Writing- Review and editing: (All Authors), Visualisation: (SR, SB, SG), Funding Acquisition: None; Supervision: Not Applicable.
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This study is a secondary data analysis utilizing NFHS-5 data that is accessible in the public domain. Participants in the survey actively provided their consent. The survey received ethical approval from the International Institute of Population Sciences' ethical review board (IIPS). The Demographic Health Survey (DHS), after assessing the submitted proposal, approved access to the dataset.
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Roy, S., Girotra, S., Radhakrishnan, A. et al. Prevalence and determinants of tobacco consumption and oral cancer screening among men in India: evidence from a nationally representative cross-sectional Survey. J Public Health (Berl.) (2023). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10389-023-02161-3
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s10389-023-02161-3