The efficacy and predictive value of the Heavy Smoking Index for smoking cessation among daily smokers in a public health center

Abstract

Objective: The present study tested the effectiveness of the Heavy Smoking Index (HSI) for the screening of high nicotine dependence and the predictive value of HSI on smoking cessation within a community sample in a public health center. Methods: The Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence (FTND) scores from 1069 smokers who visited a public health center in Korea was analyzed. Receiver operating characteristic analyses were performed to calculate sensitivity and specificity values to compare the effectiveness of HSI to items 1 and 4 of FTND. In addition, HSI at baseline was found to predict smoking cessation after 4 weeks and after 6 months using logistic regression. We assessed whether HSI at baseline would predict smoking cessation after 4 weeks and after 6 months using logistical regression. Results: For the results, a score of 4 on HSI was considered optimal. Additionally, the predictive value for smoking cessation of both HSI and FTND were found to be statistically valid at baseline. Conclusions: Our results indicate that HSI is a useful brief screening tool to detect high nicotine dependence in a public health center.