Brief Intervention for Smokeless Tobacco Users by Dentist

The dental team has an important role to play in tobacco cessation and counselling. The present study was conducted to evaluate the effectiveness of the brief intervention for smokeless tobacco users as a longitudinal study. Ninty patients who were assessed to be in the Pre contemplation phase based on the Transtheoretical model, were included in the study. The nicotine dependence was graded according to Talwar et al (2004). Their follow up was done for 1 year. During the inception of the study all the participants showed heavy nicotine dependence. By the end of one year 10 males and 19 females became light nicotine dependent. Our study showed a reduction of 32% in the prevalence of tobacco use after the implementation of the programme using the “5 A” model.