Other substance use among high school students who use tobacco

Purpose: To examine relationships between tobacco use and use of other substances among U.S. high school students, by gender and racial/ethnic subgroups. Methods: Data about tobacco and other substance use were analyzed from the 1995 national Youth Risk Behavior Survey implemented by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. Results: Compared to nonsmokers, current smokers were significantly more likely to report use of all other substances we examined, including lifetime use of cocaine, inhalants, other illegal substances, and multiple substances and current alcohol use, episodic heavy drinking, marijuana use, and cocaine use. A strong dose-dependent relationship between current cigarette smoking and other substance use was identified. Among smokeless tobacco users, a strong dose-dependent relationship was found for all examined substances with the exception of lifetime and current cocaine use. Finally, a pattern of risk emerged suggesting that the likelihood of other substance use increases as students move from no tobacco use to smokeless tobacco use only, to cigarette smoking only, and to use of both smokeless tobacco and cigarettes. Conclusions: Programs designed to prevent tobacco or other substance use should consider that such use often occurs concomitantly. (C) Society for Adolescent Medicine, 1998