The study, published in medical journal The Lancet, is only the second trial involving e-cigarettes and compared the effectiveness of the electronic devices with that of nicotine patches in helping smokers quit. As part of the trial, a New Zealand research team recruited 657 smokers who wanted to quit. To help them quit, about 300 participants received e-cigarettes containing about 16mg of nicotine each while an equal number received nicotine patches. A third, smaller group of about 70 people received nicotine-free placebo e-cigarettes.

Participants used the cigarettes and patches for 13 weeks and were followed up for a further three months during which they were tested for cigarette use. At the end of the trial, about six percent of participants were still smoke-free. According to researchers, the results suggest that e-cigarettes are just as effective as nicotine patches in helping people to quit smoking.

The study also found that among participants who had resumed smoking, those who had smoked nicotine-containing e-cigarettes had reduced the number of cigarettes they smoked a day. More than half of people in this group cut their cigarette intake by half while only about 40 percent of those in the nicotine patch group could say the same.

“While our results don’t show any clear-cut differences between e-cigarettes and patches in terms of quit success after six months, it certainly seems that e-cigarettes were more effective in helping smokers who didn’t quit to cut down,” said lead author Chris Bullen, director of New Zealand National Institute for Health Innovation at the University of Auckland.  “It’s also interesting that the people who took part in our study seemed to be much more enthusiastic about e-cigarettes than patches, as evidenced by the far greater proportion of people in both of the e-cigarette groups who said they’d recommend them to family or friends, compared to patches.”

A third of those who had been given e-cigarettes as part of the trial were still using the devices after six months, while only one in ten nicotine patch users had continued using the patches.

More research into e-cigarette safety needed

Bullen’s study is also the first to evaluate e-cigarettes safety compare to that of nicotine patches among a large group of people. Results suggest that e-cigarettes are comparable to nicotine patches in terms of safety, although the authors caution that data from trials with much longer follow up periods will be needed to establish the long-term safety of e-cigarette use.

“There is still so much that is unknown about the effectiveness and long-term effects of e-cigarettes,” said Bullen in a statement. “Given the increasing popularity of these devices in many countries, and the accompanying regulatory uncertainty and inconsistency, larger, longer-term trials are urgently needed to establish whether these devices might be able to fulfil their potential as effective and popular smoking cessation aids.”

Peter Hajek is the director of the Tobacco Dependence Research Unit at the Wolfson Institute of Preventive Medicine at the UK’s Queen Mary University of London.  According to Hajek, the study suggests that e-cigarettes may have a role to play in helping more smokers quit.

“The key message is that in the context of minimum support, e-cigarettes are at least as effective as nicotine patches,” he said in a related comment published in The Lancet. “These advantages suggest that e-cigarettes have the potential to increase rates of smoking cessation and reduce costs to quitters and to health services.” – Health-e News Service.