Short Communication Parental awareness and attitude towards environmental tobacco smoke exposure in children with respiratory illnesses A.L. Hasniah * , Y.P. Tan, M.A. Nur Buhairah, T.W. Chan, T.I. Muhammad Nabil, S.Z. Syed Zulkifli Paediatric Department, Faculty of Medicine, Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre, Jln Yaacob Latif, 56000 Cheras, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia article info Article history: Received 21 February 2015 Received in revised form 26 August 2015 Accepted 29 October 2015 Available online xxx Introduction Environmental tobacco smoke (ETS) is one of the commonest indoor pollutants. There is overwhelming evidence that ETS exposure has obvious effects upon infants and children's respiratory health. 1,2 ETS exposure is a recognized risk factor for developing recurrent cough, wheeze or asthma symptoms at any age during childhood. 3 The earlier and the greater exposure to tobacco smoke, the higher likelihood of devel- oping asthma. 4 Infants exposed to ETS have a higher fre- quency of lower respiratory tract infections. In children with asthma, ETS exposure causes more frequent and severe asthma exacerbations and affects lung function. 5 Despite established evidence of the ETS effects on respi- ratory health, there are very limited studies on the parent's awareness and attitude towards the effects of ETS exposure among children with respiratory illnesses especially in the Asia Pacific region. This current study was primarily aimed to determine parental awareness and attitude towards the effects of ETS exposure among children with respiratory illnesses. The sec- ondary objective was to assess correlation between parent's awareness and attitude towards ETS exposure. A prospective cross-sectional study was conducted from February to April 2013 at Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia Medical Centre (UKMMC), Kuala Lumpur. The study was approved by the UKMMC Ethics Research Committee. Re- spondents were parents of children with doctor-diagnosed asthma, bronchiolitis or pneumonia, aged between 1 month and 18 years. Using universal samplings, participants were recruited from the Emergency Department and Paedi- atric Ward while parents attended to their children receiving treatment for acute respiratory illnesses or when they came for follow-up in the Paediatric Clinic. Only one of the par- ents, either father or mother, was recruited regardless of the number of children with respiratory illnesses in the family. Parents were only approached once even if the child had multiple visits. Exclusion criteria include parents of patients who were very ill or unstable during their acute illnesses. Once the written consent was obtained, parents were given a set of self-administered validated questionnaires. The questionnaires were collected immediately once they completed the task. A total of 308 parents were recruited. The majority of the respondents were mothers (70.8%). Most of them were Malays * Corresponding author. E-mail address: hasniah@ppukm.ukm.edu.my (A.L. Hasniah). Available online at www.sciencedirect.com Public Health journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/puhe public health xxx (2015) 1 e3 http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2015.10.028 0033-3506/© 2015 The Royal Society for Public Health. Published by Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved. Please cite this article in press as: Hasniah AL, et al., Parental awareness and attitude towards environmental tobacco smoke exposure in children with respiratory illnesses, Public Health (2015), http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2015.10.028