{"doi":"10.1001/jamanetworkopen.2022.6692","title":"Communication Between US Physicians and Patients Regarding Electronic Cigarette Use","abstract":"Importance: Physicians play a primary role in patient smoking cessation, yet their communication regarding e-cigarettes is not well understood. Objective: To assess physician-patient communication regarding e-cigarettes. Design, Setting, and Participants: A national cross-sectional survey in 2018 and 2019 was conducted. Participants were invited by mail; surveys were completed online. Respondents were 2058 board-certified physicians from family medicine, internal medicine, obstetrics and gynecology, cardiology, pulmonary, and oncology. Data were analyzed from August to September 2021. Exposures: Physician demographic characteristics, tobacco use, medical specialty, and harm-reduction beliefs (ie, not all tobacco products are equally harmful) applied within 2 hypothetical clinical scenarios. Main Outcomes and Measures: Physicians' self-reported e-cigarette communication (being asked about e-cigarettes by patients and recommending e-cigarettes to patients) and hypothetical e-cigarette communication in 2 clinical scenarios. Results: Among 2058 physicians, the mean (SD) age was 51.6 (10.5) years, and 1173 (58.5%) were male. More than 60% of physicians believed all tobacco products to be equally harmful. Overall, 69.8% of physicians reported ever being asked about e-cigarettes by their patients (35.9% in the past 30 days), and 21.7% reported ever recommending e-cigarettes to a patient (9.8% in the past 30 days). Pulmonologists (adjusted odds ratio [aOR], 2.14, 95% CI, 1.10-4.16) and cardiologists (aOR, 2.04; 95% CI, 1.03-4.05), as well as physicians who implemented the US Public Health Service Clinical Practice Guidelines (aOR, 1.77; 95% CI, 1.12-2.80), had greater odds of recommending e-cigarettes to patients. Physicians who endorsed a harm-reduction perspective (aOR, 3.04, 95% CI, 2.15-4.31) and had ever smoked cigarettes (aOR, 1.98; 95% CI, 1.27-3.08) were significantly more likely to recommend e-cigarettes. Physicians who reported being asked about e-cigarettes had greater odds of recommending e-cigarettes (aOR, 16.60; 95% CI, 10.33-26.68). In clinical scenarios, physicians were overall more likely to recommend e-cigarettes for cessation to an older heavy smoker with multiple unsuccessful quit attempts (49.3%; 95% CI, 47.1%-51.4%) than a younger light smoker with no prior cessation treatments (15.2%; 95% CI, 13.6%-16.7%) (P < .001). Conclusions and Relevance: In this survey study of physicians, findings suggest that physicians may recommend switching to e-cigarettes for some patients who smoke cigarettes under certain circumstances, presumably for cessation. The belief that all tobacco products are equally harmful was associated with lower rates of recommending e-cigarettes. As the evidence base grows for e-cigarette efficacy for smoking cessation, there is need for physician education regarding e-cigarette efficacy.","journal":"JAMA Network Open","year":2022,"id":249294,"datarank":0.5050943744979712,"base_score":3.367295829986474,"endowment":3.367295829986474,"self_citation_contribution":0.5050943744979712,"citation_network_contribution":0.0,"self_endowment_contribution":0.5050943744979712,"citer_contribution":0.0,"corpus_percentile":null,"corpus_rank":null,"citation_count":28,"citer_count":0,"citers_with_citation_signal":0,"citers_with_endowment":0,"datacite_reuse_total":0,"is_dataset":false,"is_dataset_confidence":0.9428,"is_data_producer":false,"deposit_databanks":null,"is_oa":true,"file_count":0,"downloads":0,"has_version_chain":false,"published_date":"2022-01-01","fair_score":null,"fair_percentile":null,"algorithm_id":"datarank_citation_only_1hop_v6","ranking_scope":"data_only","authors":[{"id":435387,"name":"Michelle Jeong","orcid":"0000-0001-5767-7766","position":1,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":889488,"name":"Arjun Teotia","orcid":"0000-0001-5955-636X","position":2,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":337296,"name":"Michelle T. Bover Manderski","orcid":"0000-0003-0000-221X","position":3,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":486529,"name":"Binu Singh","orcid":"0000-0002-9578-1908","position":4,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":337295,"name":"Mary Hrywna","orcid":"0000-0002-0717-9598","position":5,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":310224,"name":"Olivia A Wackowski","orcid":"0000-0001-9159-5473","position":6,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":304700,"name":"Michael Steinberg","orcid":"0000-0003-2661-2120","position":7,"is_corresponding":false},{"id":304694,"name":"Cristine D. Delnevo","orcid":"0000-0001-9597-4307","position":0,"is_corresponding":true}],"reference_count":42,"raw_metadata":{"citation_network_status":"fetched"},"created_at":"2026-07-19T00:24:19.356023Z","pmid":"35426926","pmcid":null,"fwci":null,"citation_percentile":null,"influential_citations":0,"oa_status":null,"license":null,"views":0,"total_file_size_bytes":0,"version_count":0,"fair_f":null,"fair_a":null,"fair_i":null,"fair_r":null,"fair_zscore":null,"fair_rationale":null,"fair_model":null,"fair_agent_version":null,"fair_fulltext_source":null,"fair_has_llm":null,"fair_computed_at":null,"clinical_trials":[],"software_tools":[],"db_accessions":[],"linked_datasets":[],"topics":[]}