Antipsychotic Treatment and Tobacco Craving in People With Schizophrenia.

OBJECTIVE: Nicotine dependence is high in schizophrenia, and craving is known to impact relapse during quit attempts. METHODS: We compared tobacco craving in smokers with schizophrenia treated with different antipsychotics. RESULTS: Mean craving scores were lowest in participants receiving first-generation antipsychotics, although these differences were not statistically significant. Craving with clozapine was not lower than with other antipsychotics. CONCLUSIONS: Further research is needed to determine whether differences in craving exist between antipsychotic classes.

Bupropion sustained release added to group support for smoking cessation in schizophrenia: a new randomized trial and a meta-analysis.

OBJECTIVE: To clarify the efficacy and tolerability of bupropion sustained release (SR) for the treatment of cigarette smoking in people with schizophrenia. METHOD: The first study is a double-blind, placebo-controlled clinical trial with 32 outpatients from the Maryland Psychiatric Research Center. From May 2003 to July 2007, clinically stable people with a DSM-IV diagnosis of schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder who smoked at least 10 cigarettes per day and who were interested in quitting smoking or cutting down were recruited for participation. All participated in a 9-week support group and were randomly assigned to receive 12 weeks of bupropion SR or placebo. The primary outcome measure was 4 weeks' sustained abstinence over the last 4 study weeks. Secondary outcome measures included decrease in smoking behavior and change in symptoms, neuropsychological performance, and side effects. In the second study, we performed an electronic literature search of MEDLINE in September 2008. Articles in English published between 2003 and 2008 were searched for the terms schizophrenia, bupropion SR, and smoking. Bibliographies of studies identified through the MEDLINE search were also examined. Case reports, open-label studies, crossover studies, and studies using nonstandard dosing of bupropion SR were excluded. In this way, 4 studies similar in methodology to the currently presented clinical trial were identified and the individual data combined in a meta-analysis. A random effects meta-analysis using Comprehensive Meta-Analysis software was used to obtain a pooled estimate of the odds ratio for 4-week smoking abstinence between bupropion SR and placebo. RESULTS: There were no significant results on the primary or secondary smoking measures for the clinical trial, although a numeric advantage favored the bupropion SR group. There were no significant findings for secondary symptom or side effect measures and no significant change in neuropsychological performance. For the meta-analysis totaling 226 subjects, there were significant findings in favor of bupropion SR. The pooled estimate of the odds ratio for 4-week abstinence was 2.7 (95% CI, 1.3 to 5.7; P = .009), and clinically significant greater smoking reduction in the bupropion SR group, with pooled difference estimates increasing over time between groups, became statistically significant by week 5 of study medication (P < .02). CONCLUSIONS: New clinical trial data and a meta-analysis strongly support the tolerability and efficacy of bupropion SR for the treatment of cigarette smoking in people with schizophrenia TRIAL REGISTRATION: clinicaltrials.gov Identifier: NCT00176449.

Smoking history and motivation to quit in smokers with schizophrenia in a smoking cessation program.

OBJECTIVE: The present study sought to better understand the relationships among smoking history, motivation to change, and smoking cessation outcomes in people with schizophrenia who smoke. METHOD: We examined smoking and quit history, negative consequences due to smoking, readiness to change, smoking temptation, and confidence to quit in a sample of people diagnosed with schizophrenia or schizoaffective disorder according to DSM-IV criteria who were participating in a larger randomized trial of bupropion SR and a psychoeducational intervention for smoking cessation. Data were collected from June 2003 to May 2005. RESULTS: At baseline, participants reported high levels of nicotine dependence and daily smoking, as well as multiple recent and lifetime quit attempts that were generally brief in nature. Participants were most concerned about the health effects of smoking and endorsed reasons for smoking related to coping with negative affect and boredom. Most participants reported wanting to quit smoking, but the sample generally reported low levels of confidence in their ability to quit. During the course of participation in the intervention, self-efficacy to quit increased while temptation to smoke decreased; however readiness to quit remained unchanged. CONCLUSION: Smoking cessation programs for people with schizophrenia should focus on teaching coping skills for negative affect, boredom, and specific "high risk situations" for smoking in addition to education, medication, or nicotine replacement therapy. Further, cessation efforts may benefit from directly addressing low self-efficacy for quitting, rather than readiness for change alone, among people with schizophrenia.

Lack of beneficial galantamine effect for smoking behavior: a double-blind randomized trial in people with schizophrenia.

Cigarette smoking is in schizophrenia is prevalent and may be due to self-medicating attempts to improve cognitive deficits related to alpha7 and alpha4beta2 nicotinic receptor dysregulation. Galantamine is an acetylcholinesterase inhibitor that acts as a positive allosteric modulator of nicotine acetylcholine receptors including both the alpha4beta2 and alpha7 subunits. In a double-blind randomized clinical trial galantamine was compared to placebo for its effects on cognitive functioning in people with schizophrenia. This manuscript reports findings for galantamine's effect on smoking behavior in people from this 12-week trial who were smokers (18 galantamine, 25 placebo). Expired CO was measured every 2 weeks and the Fagerström Test for Nicotine Dependence (FTND) was administered at baseline and endpoint. Expired CO measures in galantamine subjects were 23.0+/-9.7 ppm and 21.1+/-10.3 ppm at baseline and Week 12, respectively, compared to 20.1+/-8.5 ppm and 21.0+/-10.3 ppm at baseline and Week 12 in placebo subjects. The mean tau-b correlation between expired CO level and visit was -0.05+/-0.41 in the galantamine group and 0.13+/-0.42 in the placebo group (F=0.73, df=1,38, p=0.40), suggesting that there were no trends toward increased or decreased smoking in either group. Mean FTND scores in the galantamine group were 4.9+/-2.5 at baseline and 5.2+/-2.2 at Week 12, compared to 4.1+/-2.6 at baseline and 3.7+/-2.6 at Week 12 in the placebo group (Mantel-Haenszel chi2=5.53, df=1, p=0.019), for an effect size of 0.4. These results suggest that galantamine has no effect on cigarette smoking and that during galantamine treatment nicotine dependency scores worsen.