[Exposure to tobacco smoke among three years old children in Białystok and its influence on occurrence of respiratory tract diseases].

Addiction to tobacco smoking is very popular among young and middle age people in Poland, who are parents of pre-school children as well. Respiratory tract diseases are the main reason of visits of pre-school children in General Practice surgery. Anonymous questionnaires were given to the random sample of mothers of three years old children. 311 respondents were chosen from whole population of 1200 children attending kindergartens in Białystok. The questionnaires showed that half of the examined children are involuntary exposed to tobacco smoke at home 20% also outside home (neighbors, homes and, cafeterias, cars etc). We did not find any relationship between exposure to smoke and occurrence of respiratory tract infection in children. We presume that this may be apparently the result of the fact that many smoking parents try to not to smoke in the presence of their children. Increasing awareness of harm resulting from passive smoking is the benefit of educational campaigns in Poland.