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Majority of US doctors discussing electronic cigarettes with their patients

ver 70% of the more than 560 physicians who participated in the written survey indicated that e-cigs can help patients reduce or eliminate smoking, and nearly half said that they believe e-cigs can reduce risk. Physicians are less likely to recommend e-cigs as a way to quit smoking. The use of e-cigs for treatment is contentious, as there is currently limited evidence to support their efficacy and safety for smoking reduction or cessation. Approximately two-thirds of the physician respondents report their patients who smoke ask them about e-cigs at least some of the time, and 58% report they ask their patients who smoke about using e-cigs at least some of the time. Overall, 85% of physicians report frequently advising their patients who smoke to quit, and approximately two-thirds frequently provide assistance in helping patients to quit. Some 38% of doctors surveyed have at some point recommended e-cigs to their patients who smoke. If asked by patients whether or not they wou...
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We are all 'wired' for addiction, says researcher

In "What is Abnormal About Addiction-Related Attentional Biases?" an article in press in  Drug and Alcohol Dependence , Psychology Professor Brian Anderson argues that normal people show many of the same biases as people who are addicted to drugs. "This suggests that these seemingly 'pathological features' of addiction may in fact reflect a normal cognitive process -- that we are all to some degree 'wired' to become addicted," he explains. Anderson, who specializes in cognitive neuroscience, says one of the features that characterizes addiction is strong attentional biases for drug cues. "Attentional bias is a tendency to direct your attention to something even when it conflicts with your goals, making it difficult to ignore," he notes. "A drug cue is something that serves as a predictive cue for the experience of the drug. An example would be a syringe in the case of an injectable drug, or a bong in the case of a drug that is in...
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Smokers with newly discovered genetic markers have higher lung cancer risk

Dr. Loïc Le Marchand, a professor and leading epidemiologist in the UH Cancer Center's Epidemiology Program, and his colleagues, identified differences in the CYP2A6 gene that are associated with a high rate of nicotine metabolism. Smokers who have these CYP2A6 markers may smoke more cigarettes and/or inhale a greater amount of nicotine per cigarette than smokers who metabolize nicotine less rapidly, in order to maintain stable levels of nicotine in the blood. "Smokers adjust the way they smoke to satisfy their craving for nicotine. Nicotine is the highly addictive component in cigarettes that makes people want to smoke. Smokers with the genetic markers we discovered, smoke more extensively in order to keep their nicotine levels high and achieve the desired effects of nicotine in the brain," said Dr. Le Marchand. "This new finding could identify smokers who are at greater risk for lung cancer. The knowledge of these markers will help doctors and public health...
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Opioid receptors outside the brain targeted in rats; new direction for painkillers

"People living with chronic pain have few innovative analgesic options available to them outside of systemic opioids. Prolonged use of these opioids can result in respiratory depression, tolerance, addiction, and overdose," says senior study author Nathaniel Jeske of the University of Texas Health Science Center at San Antonio. "Being able to increase the responsiveness of peripheral opioid receptor systems could lead to a reduction in systemic opioid administration , thereby reducing the incidence of side effects." Most clinical opioids currently available target mu opioid receptors, including those located in the brain, and therefore have a high potential for abuse. By contrast, drugs targeting delta opioid receptors in the peripheral nervous system rather than the brain and spinal cord produce fewer side effects in animals and have a much lower abuse potential. However, delta opioid receptors in peripheral tissues only become activated in the presence of inf...
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US teens more likely to vape for flavorings than nicotine in e-cigarettes

The findings call into question the designation of e-cigarettes as Electronic Nicotine Delivery Systems (ENDS) and suggest that the recent spike in the popularity of e-cigarettes among this age group doesn't signal a 'nicotine epidemic' as feared, conclude the researchers. It is widely assumed that teen vapers are vaping nicotine, so in a bid to find out exactly what substances they are vaping, the researchers quizzed almost 15,000 students about their vaping experiences as part the 2015 Monitoring the Future Survey -- an annual, nationally representative study of 8th, 10th, and 12th grade students. Some 3837 of the students had vaped at some poin t, and of those who had vaped within the past month, 1701 had done so at least once; 1085 had done so up to five times; and 616 had done so more than half a dozen times. Among those who had ever vaped "just flavoring" was by far the most commonly vaped substance at last use for around two thirds of students acros...
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Physician advice to patients on e-cigarettes varies, reveals knowledge gaps, study shows

Whether you want to know about the safety of the devices -- which create an inhalable aerosol from heated liquid nicotine and flavoring -- or how to use them to quit smoking tobacco cigarettes, physicians range greatly in their responses to patients. That's one finding from a new study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine who analyzed more than 500 online interactions between patients and doctors discussing e-cigarettes. The study will be published online Aug. 26 in the  American Journal of Preventive Medicine . "Researchers have previously surveyed doctors about their knowledge and attitudes concerning e-cigarettes. In this study, we were curious about actual provider behavior -- the advice doctors gave in real patient interactions," said the study's senior author, Judith Prochaska, PhD, MPH, associate professor of medicine at the Stanford Prevention Research Center. "Within a novel online medical forum, we were able to observe the...
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Impulsivity levels help identify at-risk offspring of alcoholics

Two groups of young male and female social drinkers (34 women, 30 men; 18-33 years old) were given alcohol (0.8g/kg) or a placebo. The FHP group (n= 24) had first-degree relatives with problems of alcohol misuse; the FHN group (n=40) did not. Participants completed four variants of the Five-Choice Serial Reaction Time task, which measures waiting impulsivity. Other types of impulsive behavior were also tested, using the Stop Signal Reaction Time, Information Sampling Task, Delay Discounting Questionnaire, Two-Choice Impulsivity Paradigm, and Time Estimation. The FHP drinkers showed higher waiting impulsivity levels than FHN drinkers when tested for attentional load. However, the FHP group showed less impulsive behavior on the Information Sampling Task. All participants showed alcohol-impaired inhibitory control on the Stop Signal Reaction Time test. In summary, assessing exaggerated waiting impulsivity may help identify those offspring of alcoholics who are at risk for developin...
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