Tobacco exposure 'increases children's readmittance to hospital'

Exposing children to secondhand smoke can increase the likelihood of readmittance to hospital for asthma, according to a new study. Research has found that children that are exposed to secondhand smoke in cars or at home have a dramatically higher chance of having to return to hospital within a year of being admitted for asthma. 

Published in the journal 'Pediatrics', the new research highlights the importance of not smoking around children. It is also possible that the study's findings could be used in clinical practices that aim to help people's attempts to stop smoking. Future hospitalisations could be reduced by measuring tobacco exposure, according to the researchers.

Scientists at the Penn State Milton S. Hershey Children's Hospital and Cincinnati Children's Hospital Medical Center, US determined children's exposure to tobacco smoke by analysing the levels of cotinine in saliva and blood samples from over 600 participants. The body produces cotinine when it works to break down nicotine and so is able to provide insight into the levels of tobacco smoke that children are exposed to.

Dr Robert Kahn, associate director of general and community pediatrics at Cincinnati Children's Hospital, said: "The ability to measure serum and salivary cotinine levels presents the possibility of an objective measure that can be obtained when a child is seen in the emergency department or in the hospital and may be used to predict future hospitalisations. 

"Such a measure for exposure to tobacco smoke could be used to target specific interventions at caregivers of those children before discharge from the hospital. Several interventions, including parental counseling and contact with the primary care physician, could be adopted in clinical practice."  

The new research is part of a wider study that is looking at possible reasons for hospital readmissions among children with asthma. The Greater Cincinnati Asthma Risks Study is putting particular focus on hospital readmissions among children aged between one and 16 that come from minority or low income families. Findings could help to reduce the number of children that experience health complications as a result of asthma.