Transdermal nicotine as maintenance therapy for ulcerative colitis

What Was Tested

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

Ulcerative colitis is largely a disease of nonsmokers.

Who Took Part

The study group was 80 patients.

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

The researchers treated 80 patients with ulcerative colitis in remission with either transdermal nicotine or placebo patches for six months in a randomized, double-blind study.

Clinical, sigmoidoscopic, and histologic assessments were made at the beginning and the end of the study, or at relapse.

How the Study Was Run

The researchers set it up as a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study.

The patients were allocated by chance, so the Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) group and the comparison group should start out alike.

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

Some patients received a placebo instead of Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide), giving a reference point.

The methods mention a period of six months.

Side effects and serum nicotine and cotinine concentrations were monitored throughout the study.

What Was Measured

The subject headings attached to it are Administration, Cutaneous, Colitis, Ulcerative, Cotinine, Drug Monitoring, Nicotine, Patient Compliance and Remission Induction.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) in 80 patients over six months.

The abstract goes on to report its results in about 6 sentences; this page does not restate them, so read the paper for the findings and their limits.

The publication is from 1995 (The New England journal of medicine), a journal based in United States.

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