TY - JOUR T1 - Practice-based Assessment of Tobacco Usage in Southwestern Primary Care Patients: A Research Involving Outpatient Settings Network (RIOS Net) Study JF - The Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine JO - J Am Board Fam Med SP - 174 LP - 180 DO - 10.3122/jabfm.2007.02.060018 VL - 20 IS - 2 AU - Shawn Ralston AU - Nicole Kellett AU - Robert L. Williams AU - Cheryl Schmitt AU - Charles Q. North Y1 - 2007/03/01 UR - http://www.jabfm.org/content/20/2/174.abstract N2 - Purpose: Primary care clinicians rely, perhaps erroneously, on general population-based data about risk factors to help form their strategies for allocating time in the brief primary care encounter. We conducted a case study using rates of tobacco usage among people presenting for primary care to explore comparability to general population-based rates.Methods: Clinicians in RIOS Net, a practice-based research network, gathered data on tobacco use for all patients presenting during a 2-week period. We compared those data to population-based data by gender and ethnicity.Results: Ninety-one primary care clinicians reported data on 2442 patients. Primary care smoking rates differed in important ways from general population-based rates. Hispanic women smoked at more than twice the national population-based rate (25% vs 12%). Youth smoked at higher rates as well, particularly young Native American men.Conclusions: Patients seen in primary care differ in important ways in rates and patterns of tobacco usage when compared with rates reported in population-based surveys. These differences could have important implications for preventive care within the context of multiple competing demands in the primary care encounter. ER -