Beliefs about health, smoking, and future smoking cessation among South Korean men hospitalized for cardiovascular disease Min Sohn, RN, MPH, PhD, a Nancy A. Stotts, RN, EdD, a Neal Benowitz, MD, b,c Dianne Christopherson, RN, PhD, a Kyung Soo Kim, MD, PhD, d Yang Soo Jang, MD, PhD, e Mi Sook Ahn, RN, e and Erika Sivarajan Froelicher, RN, MPH, PhD a,f BACKGROUND: A particularly high rate of smoking among South Korean men corresponds to high rates of cardiovascular disease. OBJECTIVES: This study evaluated South Korean men hospitalized with cardiovascular disease to explore beliefs about the health benefits of smoking cessation, to determine smoking cessation inten- tions, and to identify factors associated with confidence in quitting smoking. METHODS: This was a cross-sectional, descriptive study. RESULTS: Of the study’s 97 participants, only 78% believed that smoking cessation avoids or decreases the chance of developing heart disease; 93% reported their intention to quit; 74% had moderate to high confidence about quitting within the month after hospital discharge; and 88% preferred to quit by themselves without help. Significant predictors of low confidence in quitting were being married (odds ratio: 5.54, 95% confidence interval: 1.33–23.08); being alcohol dependent (odds ratio: 3.25, confidence interval: 1.20 – 8.80); and starting to smoke at or before 20 years of age (odds ratio: 2.96, confidence interval: 1.14 –7.68). CONCLUSION: The study’s participants were motivated to quit smoking for their health, but they must be educated to understand that smoking is addictive and that special intervention is needed. (Heart Lung® 2007;36:339 –347.) S outh Korean men have the highest rate of smoking in the world (57%). 1 Cardiovascular disease (CVD) was the second most common cause of death among South Korean men in 2002. 2 Despite the risks associated with high rates of smoking and the evidence of a high prevalence of CVD among South Korean men, researchers have rarely investigated smoking cessation in this popu- lation. Published studies reporting the benefits of smok- ing cessation among smokers who had CVD began to appear in the 1970s. 3–7 Although their outcome measures differed, all of the studies concluded that there was a substantial benefit from smoking ces- sation in terms of mortality, survival rate, and re- current rate of CVD. 8 –11 Through these studies, re- searchers concluded that smoking cessation is probably the single most important intervention in the management of CVD. More recent data reinforce the findings of previous research. Current studies show that smoking cessation in patients with CVD reduced the rate of recurrent CVD events by 40%, after 1-year follow-up, 12 and the mortality rate due to recurrent CVD events by 17%, after 20-year follow-up. 13 From the a Department of Physiological Nursing, School of Nurs- ing and b Departments of Medicine, Psychiatry, and Biopharma- ceutical Sciences, University of California, San Francisco, Califor- nia; c Division of Clinical Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics, Medical Service, San Francisco General Hospital Medical Center, San Francisco, California; d Department of Cardi- ology, Hanyang Medical Center, Hanyang University, Seoul, South Korea; e Department of Cardiology, Yonsei Medical Center, Yonsei University, Seoul, South Korea; and f Department of Epi- demiology and Biostatistics, School of Medicine, University of California, San Francisco, California. Funding sources: Century Club Fund and Graduate Research Fund, University of California, San Francisco, California. Reprint requests: Min Sohn, RN, MPH, PhD, Department of Phys- iological Nursing, N631, School of Nursing, University of Califor- nia, San Francisco, 2 Koret Way, San Francisco, CA 94143-0610. 0147-9563/$ – see front matter Copyright © 2007 by Mosby, Inc. doi:10.1016/j.hrtlng.2006.11.001 ISSUES IN PULMONARY NURSING HEART & LUNG VOL. 36, NO. 5 www.heartandlung.org 339