Research Review: Does Taking an Anti-smoking Drug Longer Make Quitting Easier?

If you have talked to your doctor about quitting smoking, you may have been told about varenicline. Considered the leading smoking cessation medication, it has been offered since 2006 under the brand names Chantix and Champix and is now available in generic form.

The first author of a recent University at Buffalo study, Larry Hawk, PhD, Professor, Coordinator of Research Advancement, Department of Psychology, College of Arts and Sciences and a 2019-20 Clinical and Translational Science Institute (CTSI) Pilot Study Principal Investigator, says his team was focused on determining whether this smoking cessation treatment could be even more effective.

As detailed in a recent UBNow article, while the medication remains a strong option for smokers seeking to stop, the researchers found that extending the duration the drug is taken prior to stopping tobacco use did not significantly improve the likelihood of quitting for good.

“Previous research shows that varenicline is very helpful in quitting,” Hawk explains. “Our efforts to make it work even better didn’t pan out, though we hold out some hope that the extended pre-quit approach may be useful for women.”

Hawk stresses that people who are interested in quitting should still consider medication like varenicline. It works for many people, and he urges anyone interested to talk to their doctors about this option.

“Medication substantially increases the odds of quitting and staying quit,” he says. “Based on a wealth of clinical research data, the two best medication approaches are varenicline or dual-NRT — using both the patch, a long-acting nicotine replacement therapy [NRT], and a short-acting NRT such as the lozenge or gum to help with break-through cravings."

While considering its next smoking cessation project, Hawk says the research team is also working on "two big questions regarding nicotine vaping, currently one of the most popular ways people are trying to quit smoking: How do we best capture vaping behavior/patterns and how severe is vaping withdrawal (compared to cigarette withdrawal)?" Information on each of these two new NIH-funded studies can be found here.