Passive Smoking and Lung Disease in Children, Systematic Review

Abstract

Background: Children's morbidity and mortality are greatly increased by passive cigarette smoke exposure. Preterm delivery, intrauterine growth retardation, perinatal death, respiratory illnesses, neurobehavioral issues, and lower academic performance have all been linked to environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) as having negative effects on children's health. This systematic review aims to comprehensively assess recent literature on prevalence of passive smoking in association with lung diseases in children. Methods: Comprehensive searches were conducted across PubMed, Web of Science, Science Direct, Cochrane Library, and Google Scholar to include pertinent literature. The Rayyan QRCI tool facilitated this systematic approach. Results: A total of 490 study articles resulted from the systematic search, and 53 duplicates were deleted. Title and abstract screening were conducted on 437 studies, and 390 studies were excluded. Forty-seven reports were sought for retrieval, and only 7 articles were not retrieved. Finally, 40 studies were screened for full-text assessment; 17 were excluded for wrong study outcomes, and 6 for the wrong population type. Seventeen eligible study articles were included in this systematic review. Conclusion: ETS exposure has a considerable negative impact on children's morbidity and death. Children appear to be the population group most vulnerable to the negative impacts of ETS. There should be a consolidation of more efficient governmental policies and initiatives to safeguard preschoolers from ETS.