Dose-related cardiovascular and endocrine effects of transdermal nicotine

What Was Tested

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

There are some concerns about the adverse cardiovascular effects of nicotine, especially with concomitant smoking.

Who Took Part

By PubMed's age tags, the people studied were adults and middle-aged adults, men only.

The subjects smoked during the first 4 days of each treatment and abstained from smoking during the fifth day.

Ambulatory 24-hour daytime and nighttime heart rate and blood pressure values were determined for each treatment; plasma nicotine, cotinine, and carboxyhemoglobin levels and urinary catecholamines with aldosterone were measured on days 4 and 5.

How the Study Was Run

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

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

Only one side, usually the participants, was kept unaware of whether Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) was given.

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

Each person switched between Therapeutic nicotine (patch, non-peptide) and the comparison at some point, usually with a gap in between.

The data were compared by means of repeated-measures ANOVA.

What Was Measured

PubMed files the paper under topics including Administration, Cutaneous, Analysis of Variance, Blood Pressure, Cardiovascular System, Endocrine System, Ganglionic Stimulants and Heart Rate.

What This Means in Plain Language

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

The abstract goes on to report its results in about 4 sentences; this page does not restate them, so read the paper for the findings and their limits.

The publication is from 1998 (Clinical pharmacology and therapeutics), a journal based in United States.

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