Which smokers are helped to give up smoking using transdermal nicotine patches? Results from a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial

What Was Tested

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

The three forms now available--transdermal patches, chewing gum and nasal spray--deliver nicotine at different rates and to different levels.

Therefore, it might be expected that smokers with different characteristics, and at different levels of nicotine dependence, will be helped more by one or other method.

Who Took Part

The abstract describes 1992, patients taking part.

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

The trial, conducted in 1990-1992, involved 1686 patients recruited from 19 general practices in Oxfordshire.

How the Study Was Run

The design is described as randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled.

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).

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

Data from a randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled trial of nicotine transdermal patches were analysed retrospectively.

The main outcome measure was continuous smoking cessation from 8 to 52 weeks after the start of patch use, biochemically validated at 12, 24 and 52 weeks.

What Was Measured

The three forms now available--transdermal patches, chewing gum and nasal spray--deliver nicotine at different rates and to different levels.

Therefore, it might be expected that smokers with different characteristics, and at different levels of nicotine dependence, will be helped more by one or other method.

The subject headings attached to it are Administration, Cutaneous, Age Factors, Nicotine, Odds Ratio and Smoking Cessation.

What This Means in Plain Language

The paper is a randomized, double-blind and placebo-controlled study of Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) in 1992, patients.

With several hundred people or more, it is a fairly large study for this kind of research.

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 1996 (The British journal of general practice : the journal of the Royal College of General Practitioners), a journal based in England.

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