Nicotine Patches for Pregnant Smokers, No Effects

Nicotine patches do not help women given up smoking during pregnancy, according to landmark research by the University of Nottingham. Scientists from the university's UK Centre for Tobacco Control Studies have just completed the largest clinical study into whether standard-sized patches help pregnant women to quit. A total of 1,050 woman, between the ages of 16 and 50 and between 12 to 24 weeks pregnant, were randomly chosen from seven antenatal clinics to take part in the study. The results will be published in The New England Journal of Medicine today. Leading the study, Professor Tim Coleman, said: "We think our findings are hugely significant. Smoking in pregnancy is the leading preventable cause of morbidity, death and health problems among women and babies. "Clearly standard dose nicotine patches do not work in pregnancy as well as they do in the general smoking population. "More research is needed; higher dose patches might be effective but women would also need to be persuaded to use these for longer and research into other ways to help pregnant women give up is also needed." Although nicotine replacement therapy is proven to be an effective aid for people who want to give up smoking, never before has its effectiveness on pregnant women, who metabolize nicotine more quickly, been examined. All the women in the trial smoked ten or more cigarettes a day before they were pregnant and five or more after they became pregnant. Around 521 were assigned to eight weeks of nicotine replacement patch therapy of a daily 15 mg/16 hour nicotine patch, while 529 women were given identical placebo patches. The rate of clinically proven and successful abstinence until delivery was 9.4 per cent in the nicotine group and 7.6 per cent in the placebo group. The researchers deemed this difference non-significant. The findings of the research, funded by the National Institute for Health Research Health Technology Assessment, suggest that guidelines for healthcare professionals for smoking cessation in pregnancy should be looked at again. NIHR HTA commissions research about the effectiveness, costs, and impact of health technologies which are used by the NHS.