Science / Medicine : New Way to Kick Smoking Habit

Smokers who have tried to kick the habit with trances, gum or going cold turkey to no avail may have a new technique--a skin patch that releases nicotine slowly into the bloodstream, thereby reducing the craving for cigarettes. In a study published last week in the New England Journal of Medicine, doctors in Denmark reported new evidence that a long-lasting nicotine skin patch can help hard-core smokers break their addiction.

In tests of 289 volunteers, they found that 11% of those wearing the patch for 16 weeks were able to stay off cigarettes for a year, compared with only 2% of the people wearing a placebo patch. When the researchers excused an occasional cigarette during a weak moment, the patches were judged to be effective in 17% of the cases. The dummy patch success rate by this standard was 4%.

The team, led by Philip Tonnesen of Bispebjerg Hospital in Copenhagen, acknowledged that even a 17% success rate is not spectacular. But “if the result is compared with those of treatment of alcoholism and opiate addiction, the relapse rates and results are in the same range,” they said.