Olfactory and trigeminal interaction of menthol and nicotine in humans.

What Was Tested

This randomized controlled trial looks at Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide).

The purpose of the study was to investigate the interactions between two stimuli-menthol and nicotine-both of which activate the olfactory and the trigeminal system.

Why It Was Studied

More specifically, the researchers wanted to know whether menthol at different concentrations modulates the perception of burning and stinging pain induced by nicotine stimuli in the human nose.

The study followed an eightfold randomized, double-blind, cross-over design including 20 participants.

Who Took Part

The abstract describes 20 participants taking part.

The age groups tagged for this paper are young adults, adults and middle-aged adults, both men and women.

How the Study Was Run

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

Blinding on both sides kept the participants and researchers unaware of who received Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide).

A placebo (an inactive look-alike) gave the Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) group a baseline to be compared against.

In the crossover set-up each of the participants took both Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) and the comparison in turn, acting as their own control.

What Was Measured

Topics PubMed links to this paper include Analysis of Variance, Cross-Sectional Studies, Drug Interactions, Linear Models, Menthol, 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 20 participants.

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 2012 (Experimental brain research), a journal based in Germany.

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