A new study published at JAMA claims the best way to stop smoking may be a combination approach of a nicotine patch and medication.
The report released this week indicates that using smoking cessation medication varenicline with a nicotine replacement therapy, such as the nicotine patch, is more effective than trying to quit cold turkey.
Varenicline is also known as Chantix. A Food and Drug Administration report notes that there may be a higher risk for heart attacks and strokes for smokers who use the drug but the risk is small, notes a published report.
"In this study, to our knowledge the largest study to date examining the efficacy and safety of supplementing varenicline treatment with NRT, we have found the combination treatment to be associated with a statistically significant and clinically important higher continuous abstinence rate at 12 and 24 weeks, as well as a higher point prevalence abstinence rate at 6 months," the authors write in a release on the JAMA published study.
According to the release, Coenraad F. N. Koegelenberg, M.D., Ph.D., of Stellenbosch University, Cape Town, South Africa, and colleagues randomly assigned 446 generally healthy smokers to nicotine or placebo patch treatment two weeks before a target quit date (TQD) and continued for an additional 12 weeks.
The drug varenicline was begun one week prior to TQD, continued for a further 12 weeks, and tapered off during week 13. The study was conducted in seven centers in South Africa from April 2011 to October 2012.
Results indicate that those who received NRT and varenicline were likely to be more successful at not going back to smoking than those who just used the varenicline drug.
"The combination appears to be safe, although further studies are needed to confirm this," said Koegelenberg, an associate professor of pulmonology with Stellenbosch University and Tygerberg Academic Hospital in South Africa.
Researchers said further study is needed to determine long-term success and safety issues.
