Women's initiative for nonsmoking (WINS) IV: Description of 277 women smokers hospitalized with cardiovascular disease

Objectives This article describes the demographic, psychosocial, and medical characteristics and smoking patterns of women hospitalized with cardiovascular disease (CVD) enrolled in the Women's Initiative for Nonsmoking (WINS) trial.Design Study design is a randomized clinical trial with cross-sectional baseline data.Setting Women enrolled during a 27-month period from 10 hospitals in the San Francisco Bay Area.Participants Subjects included 277 women.Results The women's ages ranged from 33 to 86 years, with a mean age of 60.7 (+/-10) years. Most (51%) were college graduates, had attended some college or had postgraduate degrees; 40% were married; 76% were white. Median income was between 30,000 dollars and 35,000, but 27% of the women had incomes less than 15,000 dollars per year. The women smoked a median of 20 cigarettes per day (range, 1-90). Median age when women began smoking was 18.6 years; average number of years smoked was 40; and 78% had made more than 2 previous attempts to quit. On a 10-point scale, 71% of the women rated their confidence to quit smoking (self-efficacy) as 5 or greater. According to the Burnam Depression Screener, 56.7% were depressed.Conclusions This is the largest study describing the smoking patterns of women hospitalized with CVD. These women were older, white, had smoked for many years, were moderately to highly addicted to tobacco, had few financial resources, and a large proportion were depressed. These important psychosocial factors need to be taken into account when planning smoking cessation interventions for women with CVD.