TY - JOUR
T1 - Tea drinking, passive smoking, smoking deception and serum cotinine in the Scottish heart health study
AU - Tunstall-Pedoe, Hugh
AU - Woodward, Mark
AU - Brown, C. A.
N1 - Funding Information:
Acknowledgements-The Scottish Heart Health Study was funded largely by the Scottish Home and Health Department and the smoking component by the Tobacco Products Research Trust. The opinions expressed are those of the authors and not of these organizations.
Copyright:
Copyright 2014 Elsevier B.V., All rights reserved.
PY - 1991
Y1 - 1991
N2 - Following a recent claim that the use of cotinine in body fluids, to assess passive smoking and smoking "deception", was confounded by metabolic individuality, and by non-tobacco sources of dietary nicotine, particularly tea, data were examined from a large cross-sectional survey in a tea-drinking population. In 3383 men and women aged 44-59 years from the Scottish Heart Health Study, defined as non-smokers, both by self-report and by low thiocyanate and expired air carbon monoxide levels, serum cotinine showed minimal association with self-reported daily average tea consumption. However, there was a strong correlation between degree of self-reported passive tobacco smoke exposure and median serum cotinine level. In the same survey, serum cotinine in 4144 self-reported non-smokers and in 3326 smokers showed entirely different distributions, but the same range, suggesting heavy nicotine intake in some "non-smokers". These analyses confirm that cotinine levels in true non-smokers reflect far more the nicotine in inhaled ambient tobacco smoke than they do nicotine in tea. Some smoking "deceivers" have the same degree of exposure to nicotine as heavy smokers. Despite individual variability, the claim of confounding is poorly supported, and cotinine is confirmed as an indicator both of passive smoking and of smoking deception.
AB - Following a recent claim that the use of cotinine in body fluids, to assess passive smoking and smoking "deception", was confounded by metabolic individuality, and by non-tobacco sources of dietary nicotine, particularly tea, data were examined from a large cross-sectional survey in a tea-drinking population. In 3383 men and women aged 44-59 years from the Scottish Heart Health Study, defined as non-smokers, both by self-report and by low thiocyanate and expired air carbon monoxide levels, serum cotinine showed minimal association with self-reported daily average tea consumption. However, there was a strong correlation between degree of self-reported passive tobacco smoke exposure and median serum cotinine level. In the same survey, serum cotinine in 4144 self-reported non-smokers and in 3326 smokers showed entirely different distributions, but the same range, suggesting heavy nicotine intake in some "non-smokers". These analyses confirm that cotinine levels in true non-smokers reflect far more the nicotine in inhaled ambient tobacco smoke than they do nicotine in tea. Some smoking "deceivers" have the same degree of exposure to nicotine as heavy smokers. Despite individual variability, the claim of confounding is poorly supported, and cotinine is confirmed as an indicator both of passive smoking and of smoking deception.
KW - Cotinine
KW - Food frequency questionnaire
KW - Passive smoking
KW - Smoking deception
KW - Tea drinking
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U2 - 10.1016/0895-4356(91)90102-F
DO - 10.1016/0895-4356(91)90102-F
M3 - Article
C2 - 1753272
AN - SCOPUS:0026357222
SN - 0895-4356
VL - 44
SP - 1411
EP - 1414
JO - Journal of Clinical Epidemiology
JF - Journal of Clinical Epidemiology
IS - 12
ER -