Iranian Journal of

Background & Objectives: Tobacco smoking is known to cause a huge burden of disease throughout the world: smoking is responsible for 4 million deaths per year. This study is performed in order to fill the existing gaps in information regarding current trends for lifestyle and tobacco-related disease in Iran.
Methods: This was a cross-sectional study performed with the help of a questionnaire and using a multi-stage cluster sampling method. The final sample size, after the screening of the data, was 84706 out of 89457 records.
Results: From a total of 84706 people in this study, 49.7% were men, 52% were uneducated and 64.8% cane from urban areas 79.9% did not smoke, 15.3% smoked actively, 2.1% were non-active smokers and 2.7% were ex-smokers. The prevalence of smoking was higher in people aged 35 to 64 years (P<0.001). Quitting rates increased with age, especially in women (P<0.001). Smoking was more prevalent in men (P<0.001) and in rural areas (P<0.001). The average number of cigarettes smoked per day was 14.69. Smoking prevalence was lower among adults with higher levels of education compared to those with lower education levels (P<0.001).
Conclusions: This nationwide survey provides a baseline for future longitudinal studies of smoking in Iran. There is a need for effective smoking prevention and cessation programs with a focus on the young population.

Background & Objectives: The number of road traffic accidents (RTAs) and their mortality are increasing in the world. In Iran, RTAs have caused life losses and economical damages. Death is the most important consequence of the accidents in terms of social, economic, and even political expenditures. This paper reports the statistics of the mortality status in the last decade.

Methods: A 10-year study was conducted on national and provincial data of the last decade collected by Legal Medicine Research Center. The population information provided by the National Center of Statistics was used. SPSS 15.5 and Microsoft Office Excel 2007 were used for data analysis.

Results: Between 2001 and 2010, the annual average of 34.6 per hundred thousand people were killed in traffic accidents, more than 80% of the casualties are men. The highest number of deaths and injuries was observed in 2005 and the lowest occurred in 2001. RTAs had a descending trend trough the last decade but the rate of injuries increased. The death rates in Semnan, Qazvin, and Kerman were the highest and in Tehran, Ardabil, and West Azarbaijan were the lowest.

Conclusion: Although mortality rates due to RTAs declined during the last four years of the study period, direct and indirect costs of deaths resulting from RTAs in Iran are a sign of crisis.

Calculation of Cronbach's Alpha which measures the internal reliability of a tool is easy, but misuse and misconception are widely observed. Common misunderstandings of the Cronbach's Alpha include inability to differentiate between being one-dimensional and consistency, and between raw and standardized alpha. Violations of the assumptions of alpha could also cause an increase or decrease in the calculated alpha. In this paper, we showed that a very large but confusing alpha coefficient could be obtained, particularly when the one-dimensional theory is violated. Also, the use of standard error measurement as an index of the reliability has been presented. Finally, the generalizability of alpha coefficient is also discussed.