July 26

Global Tobacco Epidemic, 2011: Warning About The Dangers Of Tobacco.WHO

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The World Health Organization has released The Report on the Global Tobacco Epidemic, 2011: warning about the dangers of tobacco.The report examines in detail the two primary strategies to provide health warnings – labels on tobacco product packaging and anti-tobacco mass media campaigns. It provides a comprehensive overview of the evidence base for warning people about the harms of tobacco use as well as country-specific information on the status of these measures. You can download the full report here.From UN Pulse Permanent Link: WHO report on the global tobacco epidemic, 2011
May 24

How Secondhand Smoke Affects The Brain

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Secondhand smoke has a direct, measurable impact on the brain similar to what’s seen in the person doing the smoking, according to a new study. The finding highlights the importance of limiting exposure to secondhand smoke in cars and other enclosed spaces.

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A team led by Dr. Arthur Brody of the University of California, Los Angeles, set out to study how secondhand smoke affects the human brain. They used an imaging technique to visualize when nicotine occupies brain nAChRs. The method depends on a special tracer molecule that binds specifically to nAChRs and can be detected by positron emission tomography (PET). Nicotine displaces the tracer molecule at the receptor, so the more nicotine that binds to nAChRs, the lower the tracer signals.

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The researchers found that about 1 in 5 nAChRs in the brains of both smokers and non-smokers became occupied by nicotine after 1 hour of exposure to secondhand smoke. The smokers also had a significant increase in craving following exposure to secondhand smoke.

“These results show that even limited secondhand smoke exposure delivers enough nicotine to the brain to alter its function,” says NIDA Director Dr. Nora D. Volkow. “Chronic or severe exposure could result in even higher brain nicotine levels, which may explain why secondhand smoke exposure increases vulnerability to nicotine addiction.”

National Institutes of Health

 

July 23

Cut Down To Quit With Nicotine Replacement Therapies In Smoking Cessation : A Systematic Review

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Cut down to quit with nicotine replacement therapies in smoking cessation : a systematic review
This systematic review aimed to establish whether nicotine replacement therapies (NRT) are clinically and cost effective in helping people to cut down their smoking. For smokers who are unable or unwilling to stop smoking quickly, benefits can be gained from a strategy of gradually cutting down using the more prolonged support of nictotine replacement therapy. Using the various NRT interventions available such as inhalator, nasal spray, lozenge, gum, patch, the report analysed several randomised controlled trials (RCT) and concludes that NRT is an effective intervention in achieving sustained smoking abstinence for smokers who declare unwillingness or inability to attempt an abrupt quit. Authored by Wang, D. et.al and published in January 2008, this 156 page report and executive summary is number 12(2) in the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Health Technology Assessment (HTA) programme monograph series from the National Coordinating Centre for Health Technology Assessment (NCCHTA), part of the Wessex Institute at the University of Southampton. Intute.ac.uk
http://www.hta.ac.uk/project/1542.asp