Smoking and injury in Royal Marines' training.

BACKGROUND Training for the Royal Marines (RMs) is considered to be one of the most arduous military training regimes in the world. Approximately 16% of the annual intake of recruits suffer an injury. Smoking has been found to be a predisposition to injury. OBJECTIVE To examine the relationship between recruits' smoking status on entry to training and subsequent incidence of injury. METHOD Retrospective, longitudinal analysis of 1 year's intake of RM recruits at Commando Training Centre Royal Marines. RESULTS A significantly greater proportion of RM recruits who were smokers on entry to training experienced a physical injury during the course than their non-smoking counterparts (chi-square = 8.15, P < 0.01). A recruit who smoked on entry to training was almost twice as likely to acquire an injury during training [relative risk = 1.7 (95% CI = 1.2-2.8)]. CONCLUSION Smoking status of RM recruits in training was significantly associated with injury.