Title

Urban-rural comparison of adolescent tobacco use and oral mucosal lesions

Authors

Gaurav Gupta*, Sonali Mallick, Abhishek Awasthi, Sarvesh Bansal, Anant Kumar & Suman Kriti

Affiliation

Department of Public Health Dentistry, RKDF Dental College and Research Centre, Bhopal, Madhya Pradesh, India; *Corresponding author

Email

Gaurav Gupta - E-mail: dr.gauravgupta.d@gmail.com
Sonali Mallick - E-mail: sonalimallick.dr@gmail.com
Abhishek Awasthi - E-mail: awasthitalent@gmail.com
Sarvesh Bansal - E-mail: sarveshbansal@yahoo.com
Anant Kumar - E-mail: anant.6822.ak@gmail.com
Suman Kriti - E-mail: sumankriti88@gmail.com

Article Type

Research Article

Date

Received August 1, 2026; Revised August 31, 2026; Accepted August 31, 2026, Published August 31, 2026

Abstract

Adolescent tobacco use remains a preventable public health problem because early initiation increases nicotine dependence and exposes the oral mucosa to carcinogenic and irritant products before adulthood. Therefore, it is of interest to compare tobacco use patterns and oral mucosal lesions among 600 adolescents aged 13-17 years from urban and rural schools. Data were collected using a structured tobacco-use questionnaire and standardized oral examination; associations were tested using chi-square test, independent t-test and multivariable logistic regression. Current tobacco use was higher in rural adolescents than urban adolescents (17.3% versus 10.0%, p=0.009), with smokeless tobacco predominating in the rural group; oral mucosal lesions were detected in 12.7% of participants and were significantly more common among tobacco users than non-users (38.8% versus 8.5%, p<0.001). Rural residence, male sex, smokeless tobacco use, higher frequency of use and longer duration of habit were independent predictors of oral mucosal lesions, emphasizing the need for school-centered tobacco prevention and early oral screening in both urban and rural settings.

Keywords

Adolescents, oral mucosal lesions, smokeless tobacco, tobacco use, rural health, urban health, school oral screening

Citation

Gupta et al. Bioinformation 22(8): 5381-5386 (2026)

Edited by

Hiroj Bagde

ISSN

0973-2063

Publisher

Biomedical Informatics

License

This is an Open Access article which permits unrestricted use, distribution, and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly credited. This is distributed under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License.