
Fiona DobbieUniversity of Edinburgh | UoE · Usher Institute
Fiona Dobbie
Doctor of Philosophy
About
108
Publications
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Publications
Publications (108)
Background
To explore continuities and changes in gambling behaviour during the COVID-19 pandemic and the factors that influenced these among a sample of regular sports bettors.
Methods
A longitudinal qualitative study using in-depth interviews. Sixteen sports bettors living in Britain took part in the first interviews in July-November 2020, and 1...
Background
In the UK, recent evidence of young people and gambling indicates a higher prevalence of gambling in comparison to other addictive behaviours. Engaging in gambling-related behaviour at a young age is associated with short and long-term consequences, including financial, emotional, academic, interpersonal, and physical and mental health d...
Background
Article 14 of the WHO ‘Framework Convention on Tobacco Control’ recommends, that all oral healthcare providers provide support for tobacco cessation, to all patients. Despite evidence on the effectiveness of tobacco cessation interventions in dental settings, implementation remains low in most high-burden countries like Pakistan. A pragm...
Introduction
Evidence on smokeless tobacco (ST) cessation interventions is scarce. The South Asian (SA) region which shares more than 90% of the burden of ST use, is grossly underrepresented in research on ST cessation. This study aimed to assess the feasibility of delivering and investigating a behavioural support intervention for ST cessation in...
Background
In the UK, recent evidence of young people and gambling indicates a higher prevalence of gambling in comparison to other addictive behaviours. Engaging in gambling-related behaviour at a young age is associated with short and long-term consequences, including financial, emotional, academic, interpersonal, and physical and mental health d...
Introduction:
Despite evidence on the effectiveness of tobacco cessation interventions in dental settings, the implementation remains low, especially for smokeless tobacco (ST). The purpose of this study was to develop an understanding of the influences governing the implementation of ST cessation support in dental hospitals.
Methods:
A multi-ce...
Background
Smoking prevalence and the associated poor health and mortality is significantly higher among people with/recovering from problematic drug or alcohol (PDA) use in comparison with the general population. Evidence from existing systematic reviews shows smoking cessation enhances rather than compromises long-term abstinence from alcohol or...
Objective
This study aims to measure the extent of illicit cigarette consumption from single stick sales, to determine the nature and types of illicit cigarettes present in Ghana, and to identify the factors associated with illicit cigarette consumption in Ghana.
Design
A cross-sectional study using empty cigarette packs generated by 1 day’s singl...
Background
A relationship between smoking and interpersonal influences has been well established within the literature. There have been cultural shifts in denormalisation and a reduction in tobacco smoking in many countries. Hence there is a need to understand social influences on adolescents’ smoking across smoking normalisation contexts.
Methods...
Introduction:
The health of women in rural communities is adversely impacted by increased rates of tobacco use linked to socio-economic disadvantage (SED) and by limited access to services. We Can Quit (WCQ) is a smoking cessation programme delivered by trained lay women (community facilitators) in local communities, which was developed using a Co...
Background:
Despite the continued global decline in adult tobacco prevalence, rates continue to be significantly higher in groups with problematic drug or alcohol use (PDA). It is estimated that people with alcohol, drug or mental health problems account for approximately half of all smoking deaths. In the UK, there are free stop smoking services...
Background
A smoking cessation programme ‘We Can Quit’ was developed in Ireland tailored to socio-economically disadvantaged (SED) women. The programme includes group-based support delivered by trained lay local women and free nicotine replacement therapy (NRT) delivered weekly over 12 weeks. The intervention was pilot tested in a cluster randomise...
Background
Smoking tobacco poses a serious risk of early preventable death and disease for women living with socioeconomic disadvantage (SED). A smoking cessation programme ‘We Can Quit’ (WCQ) tailored to women living in four SED areas developed in Ireland included group support delivered by trained lay local women and free nicotine replacement the...
Background
The relationship between smoking and interpersonal influences has been well established within the literature. There has been a cultural shift in denormalisation and a reduction in tobacco smoking. Despite this, socioeconomic inequality in smoking has prevailed. This highlights the pressing need to understand health inequalities in relat...
Background
Smoking poses a serious risk of early preventable death and disease especially for women living with socio-economic disadvantage (SED). A smoking cessation programme, ‘We Can Quit’, was developed in Ireland tailored to SED women. This includes group-based support delivered by trained lay local community facilitators (CFs) and free nicoti...
Introduction
This systematic review and meta-analysis assessed the effectiveness of smoking cessation interventions among women smokers in low socio-economic status (SES) groups or women living in disadvantaged areas who are historically underserved by smoking cessation services.
Methods
A systematic literature search was conducted using MEDLINE (...
Background
Shisha smoking predisposes the users to cardiovascular diseases, cancer, and infections, such as tuberculosis, hepatitis, and herpes. In Ethiopia, there is little data on the adolescents’ shisha smoking experience. This study aimed to explore the lived experience of high school students and inform ongoing and future prevention and contro...
Objectives/Aim
To adapt a structured behavioural support intervention for smokeless tobacco (ST) cessation and to assess the feasibility and acceptability of delivering the intervention via dentists within dental settings in Pakistan.
Material and methods
The study will have 3 phases: (1) Adapt a previously developed intervention to make it suitab...
The use and sale of smokeless tobacco (SLT) is prohibited in Uganda under the Tobacco Control Act (TCA), 2015. Nonetheless, SLT products remain available, and there are limited and inconsistent data on SLT users. Additionally, the perceptions of tobacco control stakeholders on SLT are unknown, making it difficult to determine barriers to enforcing...
Background:
There is a higher incidence of cardiac arrest in economically deprived areas; however, data show that bystander cardiopulmonary resuscitation (CPR) in those areas is lower. This results in lower survival rates, placing those communities at a double disadvantage. This systematic review explored the barriers and facilitators to engaging...
Background
“We Can Quit2” (WCQ2) was a pilot cluster randomised controlled trial with an embedded process evaluation assessing the feasibility and acceptability of ‘We Can Quit’ (WCQ, a peer-delivered community-based stop-smoking programme for women in disadvantaged communities. The control group comprised ‘enhanced usual care’ offered by the Irish...
Background
Whilst prevalence of youth smoking in middle and high income countries has decreased, inequality has prevailed. The introduction of legislation regulating tobacco use in public spaces varies across countries, impacting the tobacco control context. Thus reviewing our knowledge of how social networks may influence smoking differently withi...
Introduction
We Can Quit” (WCQ) is community-based stop-smoking program delivered by trained community facilitators, based on the socio-ecological framework and developed using a Community-based Participatory Research approach, targeting women living in socioeconomically disadvantaged (SED) areas of Ireland.
Aims and Methods
The We Can Quit2 (WCQ2...
Commercial gambling is increasingly viewed as being part of the unhealthy commodities industries, in which products contribute to preventable ill-health globally. Britain has one of the world’s most liberal gambling markets, meaning that the regulatory changes there have implications for developments elsewhere. A review of the British Gambling Act...
Background: Smoking poses a serious risk of early preventable death and disease especially for women living with socio-economic disadvantage (SED). A smoking cessation programme ‘We Can Quit’ was developed in Ireland tailored to SED women. The programme includes group-based support delivered by trained lay local women and free nicotine replacement...
Background
Smoking tobacco poses a serious risk of early preventable death and disease for women living with socioeconomic disadvantage (SED). A smoking cessation programme ‘We Can Quit' (WCQ) tailored to women living in four SED areas developed in Ireland included group support delivered by trained lay local women and free nicotine replacement the...
Background
“We Can Quit2” (WCQ2) was a pilot cluster randomised controlled trial with an embedded process evaluation assessing the feasibility and acceptability of ‘We Can Quit’ (WCQ), a peer-delivered community-based stop-smoking programme for women in disadvantaged communities. The control group comprised ‘enhanced usual care’ offered by the Iris...
In many families grandparents play an essential role by providing secondary care for grandchildren. The family is a key setting for promoting children’s health; however, studies describing health initiatives with grandparents are rare. Grandparents could play an important role in promoting health for their grandchildren within their families and co...
Prevalence of non-communicable diseases (NCDs) is growing globally, with the greatest increase in NCD deaths expected to occur in sub-Saharan Africa (SSA) over the next five to 15 years. Tobacco use is implicated in all leading NCDs, and is one of the biggest global public health threats. Despite the projected increase in tobacco-related NCD deaths...
Background
Concerns about the magnitude of illicit cigarette trade have prevented the Government of Pakistan from increasing tobacco taxes. We estimated the proportion of illicit cigarettes sold in Pakistani cities. Moreover, we compared two methods for collecting cigarette packs and investigated if the illicit cigarette trade equates to tax evasio...
Background
The COVID-19 pandemic has affected over 45 million people and caused over a million deaths globally. Tobacco use, a threat to public health worldwide, increases the risk of developing severe COVID-19 disease and death. The hand-to-mouth action, smoking-induced lung diseases, and the sharing of tobacco products such as water pipes, increa...
Background: Whilst prevalence of youth smoking in middle and high income countries has decreased, inequality has prevailed. The introduction of legislation regulating tobacco use in public spaces varies across countries, impacting the tobacco control context. There is a need to revisit our understandings of the influence of social networks on smoki...
Background
In Britain, unprecedented restrictions on daily life associated with the Covid-19 pandemic included the suspension of professional sports events during the initial ‘lockdown’. This provides opportunities to observe changes in sports bettors’ behaviour when their primary form of activity is removed and assess the impact of Covid-19 relate...
Introduction:
Implementation of and compliance with smoke-free policies (SFPs) can be problematic in many low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) due to limited resources. This study evaluated knowledge, opinions and compliance related to Ghana's SFPs among owners and staff of hospitality venues by city, staff designation, and venue type.
Method...
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Background:
The COVID-19 pandemic has caused more than 900,000 deaths globally. The risk of mortality is higher for people with pre-existing conditions such as cancers, respiratory and cardiovascular diseases and diabetes for which tobacco use is a known risk factor. We conducted a study to explore how efforts to address the COVID-19 pandemic in U...
Background
Public attitude is a political driver in successful implementation of tobacco control policies. We assessed support for a range of tobacco control policies among smokers in Pakistan.
Methods
We conducted a household survey among adult smokers in 10 cities of Pakistan, using a twostage random sampling strategy to select households and Kis...
The COVID-19 pandemic led to unprecedented restrictions on people’s movements and interactions, as well as the cancellation of major sports events and social activities, directly altering the gambling landscape. There is urgent need to provide regulators, policy makers and treatment providers with evidence on the patterns and context of gambling du...
The illicit tobacco trade undermines the effectiveness of tobacco tax policies; increases the availability of cheap cigarettes, which, in turn, increases tobacco use and tobacco related deaths; and causes huge revenue losses to governments. There is limited evidence on the extent of illicit tobacco trade particularly cigarettes in Bangladesh. The p...
Study aim
Rates of out of hospital cardiac arrest are higher in deprived communities. Bystander Cardiopulmonary Resuscitation (BCPR) can double the chance of survival but occurs less often in these communities in comparison to more affluent communities. People living in deprived communities are, therefore, doubly disadvantaged and there is limited...
INTRODUCTION
Ghana has a partial smoking ban with smoking allowed in designated smoking areas. Studies evaluating smoke-free laws are scarce in Sub-Saharan Africa. Evaluation of smoke-free laws is an effective means of measuring progress towards a smoke-free society. This study assessed the level of compliance to the provisions of the current smok...
Studying Tobacco users Of Pakistan (STOP) is the largest survey of smokers ever conducted in Pakistan. It was conducted between 2019-2020 in the 10 most populous cities in Pakistan. 346 union councils were selected, 97,345 households were approached, 6,014 smokers were randomly selected and interviewed and 8,589 cigarette packs were analysed.
Objective
Gambling operators in the United Kingdom have introduced a voluntary ban on adverts broadcast during televised sport before 21:00 (the ‘whistle-to-whistle’ ban). To inform debates around the potential effectiveness of this ban, we examine the frequency and nature of gambling marketing in televised broadcasts across professional sporting e...
Introduction
Smokers have expressed concern about weight gain once they stop smoking and weight gain is a risk factor associated with smoking relapse. Nicotine in e-cigarettes, as well as vaping behaviour, may support smoking cessation by reducing weight gain. This study explored the factors that influence attitudes towards, and awareness of, e-cig...
Objective
The inclusion and design of age restriction warnings, harm reduction messages, and terms and conditions (T&Cs) in gambling advertising is self-regulated in the United Kingdom. Our study examines the visibility and nature of this information in a sample of paid-for gambling adverts.
Study design
Content analysis of a stratified random sam...
Background:
Smoking remains a major public health concern. School-based social networks influence uptake of smoking among peers. During the past two decades, the UK macro-systemic context within which schools are nested and interact with has changed, with anti-smoking norms having become set at a more macro-systemic level. Whilst the overall preva...
Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in Ireland with almost 6,000 smokers dying each year from smoking-related diseases. Amongst younger Irish women, smoking rates are considerably higher in those from socially disadvantaged areas compared to women from affluent areas. Women from poorer areas also experience higher rates of lung ca...
Background:
Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in Ireland with almost 6000 smokers dying each year from smoking-related diseases. The 'We Can Quit2' (WCQ2) study is a pilot pragmatic two-arm, parallel-group, cluster randomised trial that aims to explore the feasibility and acceptability of trial processes including recruitment a...
Background:
Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable deaths in the world. By 2030, more than 80% of these tobacco-related deaths will occur in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). The aim of the Tobacco Control Capacity Programme (TCCP) therefore, is to reduce tobacco-related mortality and morbidity by building research capacity in LMI...
Introduction: While most countries require health warnings on cigarette packs, the Scottish and Canadian Governments are considering requiring health warnings on cigarette sticks.
Methods: Twenty focus groups were conducted in Glasgow and Edinburgh (Scotland) with smokers (n = 120) segmented by age (16–17, 18–24, 25–35, 36–50, >50), gender and soci...
Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in Ireland with almost 6,000 smokers dying each year from smoking-related diseases. Amongst younger Irish women, smoking rates are considerably higher in those from socially disadvantaged areas compared to women from affluent areas. Women from poorer areas also experience higher rates of lung ca...
Background:
Smoking prevention programmes that reach adolescents before they experiment with tobacco may reduce the prevalence of tobacco use. ASSIST is a school-based, peer-led smoking prevention programme that encourages the diffusion of non-smoking norms among secondary school students (aged 12-13), and was shown in a randomised control trial (...
Tobacco use is the leading cause of preventable death in Ireland with almost 6,000 smokers dying each year from smoking-related diseases. Amongst younger Irish women, smoking rates are considerably higher in those from socially disadvantaged areas compared to women from affluent areas. Women from poorer areas also experience higher rates of lung ca...
Purpose of Review
Legislation and technology have led to unprecedented changes in the frequency and content of gambling marketing in many countries. We build upon previous reviews by exploring research on gambling marketing from between 2014 and 2018.
Recent Findings
Most literature reviewed was from the UK or Australia, with three key findings id...
Introduction:
Concern about weight gain is a barrier to smoking cessation. E-cigarettes may help quitters to control their weight through continued exposure to the appetite-suppressant effects of nicotine and behavioural aspects of vaping. This study explored the views and practices of smokers, ex-smokers and current e-cigarette users relating to...
Introduction
The ‘We Can Quit2’ (WCQ2) study is a pilot pragmatic two-arm, parallel-group, cluster randomised trial, that aims to explore the feasibility and acceptability of trial processes including recruitment and to estimate parameters to inform sample size estimates needed for an effectiveness trial of a community-based smoking cessation inter...
Purpose of review: Legislation and technology have led to unprecedented changes in the frequency and content of gambling marketing in many countries. We build upon previous reviews by exploring research on gambling marketing from between 2014 and 2018.Recent findings: Most literature reviewed was from the UK or Australia, with three key findings id...
Background
Bystander Cardio-Pulmonary Resuscitation (CPR) is a key determinant of survival after Out-of-Hospital Cardiac Arrest (OHCA) but is performed at only around half of OHCA in UK. This study collected data to inform a social marketing strategy to address the barriers to responding to OHCA.
Methods
A representative sample (n=1027) of Scottis...
Introduction
Mandatory policies have the potential to increase uptake of influenza (‘flu’) vaccination among healthcare workers (HCWs), but concerns have been expressed about their acceptability and effectiveness. We explored views on three mandatory policies (declination forms, face masks or reduced patient contact, and mandatory vaccination) amon...
Background:
A key determinant of survival after out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) is bystander cardio pulmonary resuscitation (CPR) which can more than double an individual's chances of surviving to discharge from hospital. The experience of other international OHCA survival programmes has shown that increasing bystander CPR is strongly associ...
Background
Smoking prevention programmes that aim to reach adolescents before they start to experiment with tobacco may contribute to reducing tobacco use. ASSIST (A Stop Smoking in Schools Trial) is a peer- led, school and social network based, smoking prevention programme that encourages the dissemination of non-smoking messages among 12–13 year...
Background:
Despite a decline in child and adult smoking prevalence, young people who smoke (even occasionally) can rapidly become addicted to nicotine, with most adult smokers initiating smoking before they are 18. Schools have long been a popular setting to deliver youth smoking prevention interventions, but evidence of the effectiveness of scho...
Survival from out-of-hospital cardiac arrest (OHCA) varies across the developed world. Although not all OHCA are recoverable, the survival rate in Scotland is lower than in comparable countries, with higher average survival rates of 7.9% in England and 9% across Europe. The purpose of this paper is to explore the barriers, facilitators and public a...
Background
ASSIST
(A Stop Smoking in Schools Trial) is a peer-led, smoking prevention, social
network intervention developed in the UK. ASSIST trains students (aged 11-13)
to work as peer supporters to disseminate non-smoking norms in their year. To
date, evaluation of ASSIST has focused on delivery within schools only. This study
sought to address...
Background
ASSSIT (A Stop Smoking in Schools Trial) is a UK peer led, school based, smoking prevention programme that encourages the dissemination of non-smoking norms among 11-13 year olds. It is based on strong evidence, with results from a large cluster randomised trial showing a reduction in smoking uptake. However, data for this trial was coll...
We explored the experiences of young people, aged 11-13, selected by their peers to become peer supporters, tasked with disseminating non-smoking norms among their year group.
Many lifestyle patterns are established when children are young. Research has focused on the potential role of parents as a risk factor for non communicable disease in children, but there is limited investigation of the role of other caregivers, such as grandparents. The aim of this review was to identify and synthesise evidence for any influence g...
Qualitative study quality–tobacco studies.
NR–Not reported.
(DOCX)
Review study quality–weight, diet and physical activity studies.
(DOCX)