National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion, Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, Atlanta, Ga 30341, USA.
To examine dentists' and physicians' effectiveness in advising patients who use tobacco to quit, the authors estimated the percentages of smokers in the United States who visited a dentist or physician in the preceding year, the percentages of those who were advised by their health care provider to quit and the percentages of those who planned to quit smoking. They also estimated the percentage of smokeless tobacco users who were ever advised by their dentist or physician to quit. The results of the study indicate that dentists and physicians may not be maximizing their opportunities to advise their patients who use tobacco to quit, or they are not adequately communicating to their patients the importance of quitting.