AbstractBackground and purpose: Electronic cigarettes have been available globally since 2003 and first became for sale in Indonesia in 2010. Users tend to be predominately young people. The purpose of this study is to determine the proportion, characteristics and factors that influence the use of electronic cigarette among university students.Method: This research used a cross sectional survey with 351 undergraduate students from a variety of disciplines at Udayana University chosen by multistage sampling. In the first phase, 10 study programs were chosen randomly from 47 courses at Udayana University. The selection of respondents was influenced by the convenience of data collection, that is, questionnaire via the Survey Monkey application. Analysis with logistic regression was used to determine the factors influencing electronic cigarette usage based on several variables.Results: The proportion of students who used tobacco cigarettes was 14.53%. Respondents who reported using electronic cigarettes numbered 61 (17.38%, 95%CI: 13.46%-21.3%), and 40.98% of them were still current smokers. As many as 88.52% of respondents who had ever used electronic cigarette are male students, and 11.48% female students. Students who had ever used electronic cigarettes in the campus area totaled 22 people (36.07%). The reasons provided for using electronic cigarettes included a desire to stop using tobacco cigarettes (29.51%), the fact that electronic cigarettes are considered safer (26.23%), are considered “cool” (22.95%), experimental reasons, and other (26.23%). Multivariate analysis showed that the variables found to be associated with the use of electronic cigarettes were gender (AOR=14.72; 95%CI: 4.34-49.87), a history of smoking tobacco cigarettes (AOR=42.16; 95%CI: 13.56-131.08), had a history of consuming alcoholic beverages (AOR=5.72; 95%CI: 2.04-16.04) as well as coming from a smoking household (AOR=3.87; 95%CI: 1.33 - 11.21).Conclusion: The proportion of students who have ever used electronic cigarettes was found to be higher than cigarette tobacco users. In addition, use was found to be greater among male students than in female students. Influencing factors associated with the use of electronic cigarettes are gender, a history of tobacco smoking, a history of consuming alcoholic beverages as well as coming from a smoking household. There is a need for prevention efforts including education and regulations to reduce the use of electronic cigarettes among students and the general public.
Exposure to Video Display Terminals and Associated Neuromuscular Pain and Discomfort in Male and Female Undergraduate University Students
