Nader Ahmadbigi - M.S.c, Physical Education and Sport Physiology

The objective of the study was to determine the effects oftobacco use on selected markers of health and lung functionin professional athletes. A total of 108 male professionalathletes participated in the study from ten ball game teams inthe same sport league in Qatar (age = 26.4 ± 5.1 yrs, height =190.6 ± 11.9 cm, and weight = 91.5 ± 16.4 kg). The athleteshave been playing professionally for about 6.3 years onaverage. In addition to demographic and tobacco use status,the following clinical variables were measured: resting bloodpressure, heart rate, FVC, FEV1 sec, and PEF. Theprevalence of tobacco use among the athletes was 27.7%.The FVC, FVC%, and FEV1% were significantly loweramong the smokers compared to the nonsmokers (p = 0.003,0.044, and 0.001, resp.). There were no significantdifferences between cigarettes smokers and nonsmokers inBP, HR, FEV1, FEV1/FVC, PEF, and PEF.