Nicotine effects on immediate and delayed verbal memory after substance use detoxification.

What Was Tested

The paper reports a study of Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide), published as a randomized controlled trial.

The Logical Memory (LM) subtest from the Wechsler Memory Scale-Revised (WMS-R) was used to assess immediate and delayed verbal memory recall.

Why It Was Studied

Decrements in verbal memory are commonly reported by detoxified treatment-seeking individuals.

Subjects had been abstinent from their drugs of choice for 41 (±18) days and were in short-term abstinence from tobacco (∼8-10 hours).

Who Took Part

The study group was 14 men.

PubMed indexes the participants as adults and middle-aged adults, both men and women.

How the Study Was Run

In design terms this was a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study.

Because people in this Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) study were split into groups at random, differences between the groups are less likely to reflect who happened to join each one.

Neither the men nor the staff measuring them knew who was on Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide), so expectations could not easily colour the readings.

The comparison arm used a placebo, so changes seen with Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) could be set against what happens without it.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Administration, Cutaneous, Attention, Mass Screening, Memory, Neuropsychological Tests, Nicotine and Nicotinic Agonists.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) in 14 men.

With fewer than 40 people, it is a small study, so it is better read as an early signal for further research than as a settled answer.

The publication is from 2011 (Journal of clinical and experimental neuropsychology), a journal based in England.

More context: the Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) compound page, all human trials.