Drug with potential to block nicotine withdrawal symptoms

FINDING it hard to beat your nicotine addiction? A common drug that helps in diabetes management might help people – and without any withdrawal symptoms, a study has found.

The study, led by researchers from the Johns Hopkins University, showed that metformin potentially blocks symptoms of nicotine withdrawal in rodents.

The team exposed laboratory mice to a twoweek regimen of nicotine and found that they displayed no withdrawal symptoms when given the diabetes drug.

Metaformin was also found to eliminate anxiety, irritability and other withdrawal symptoms in the rodents. “Metformin has ‘real potential’ as a smoking cessation aid if clinical trials confirm the findings in mice,” said Sangwon Kim, of the university.

Cigarette smoking is the leading cause of preventable illness and death. Three medicines have been approved by the US Food and Drug Administration to help people break addiction to nicotine, but smoking cessation rates remain low – at about 15% – even though some studies state that up to 70% of smokers want to quit.

Current therapies include nicotine replacement, an antidepressant and a medication aimed at reducing the cravings and pleasurable effects of cigarettes, none of which directly treats nicotine withdrawal symptoms, Kim said.

For the study, published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, the team focused on activating an enzyme known as AMP-activated protein kinase, or AMPK, which stimulates the breakdown of glucose for energy. They discovered that the AMPK pathway is activated in mammals following chronic nicotine use, but is repressed during nicotine withdrawal.

They set out to find whether AMPK, stimulated by metformin, could lessen or even eliminate the symptoms of nicotine withdrawal. They found that metformin completely prevented anxious behaviours caused by nicotine withdrawal at doses that had no effect on body weight, food consumption or glucose levels. – IANS