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Chantix, a Magic Bullet to Quit Smoking?
Is Chantix a magic bullet that can be effective to your quit smoking plans?
Well, Chantix, the newbie anti-smoking drug is said to quadruple a smoker's odds of kicking the habit, that perilous and hazardous ill-gotten habit, and is about two times as effective as another so called block-buster smoking-cessation drug, Zyban, if one are to go by studies published in the Journal of the American Medical Association.
One of the studies is of the opinion that Chantix, which won the approval of the U.S. Food and Drug Administration in the recent past on May 11, 2006 , can phenomenally lessen a smoker's probability to fall into relapse in the first six months after quitting the unsanitary smoke.
Well, the research timely presented at an American Heart Association meeting, when the whole world is going crazy at the harms the menacing habit of smoking can unleash, was heavily funded by Pfizer Inc, the all powerful drug maker, & maker of Chantix too. Experts say the research is encouraging and heartening, as smokers have very little that's pharmacologically beneficial in making them give up the smoke and kick off the nicotine addiction for good.
But are we missing the point somewhere, losing the thread in the whole gimmicks of Chantix benefits, Chantix Efficacy, Chantix Mechanism and what nots? As an editorial that accompanies the Journal of the American Medical Association (JAMA) studies gravely warns, “Much of the hype around the new drug may be unwarranted, because Chantix remains a far-from-perfect means of quitting smoking”, Chantix may not turn out to be the magic bullet to quit smoking that we are looking for.
As Robert Klesges and his colleagues at the University of Tennessee Health Science Center in Memphis wrote, whenever FDA approves a new smoking cessation medication that can aid in quit smoking, "there is often unbridled enthusiasm regarding the potential to solve the problems associated with smoking." So are the uninhibited and the rampant gusto and fervor, and the entire storm gathering around Chantix merited? Well, we don't have to wait too long for the answer.
It is true that Chantix performs better and is far more effective than either Zyban or a placebo; yet one cannot negate the high rates in terms of both its side effects and failure in treatment. As the Tennessee experts correctly concluded, Chantix is indeed a great performing quit smoking drug, but it definitely is not a panacea for smoking cessation.
So, are the realists or say the editors who are so economical and reserved in their praise of the new drug Chantix on the right, even after those ‘successful and encouraging researches'? And yes, these Pfizer funded trials were done under excellent conditions, at academic research centers where smokers were closely supervised and thoroughly tutored on the safe and proper usage of the drug, very different and indeed a far cry from the ‘real world' situation where a smoker is left to fend for himself after getting a prescription from a doctor.
Well, finally, we can say that the results of the scientific trials on the efficacy of Chantix may be promising, but let's not forget that ‘the majority of the participants in these studies did not quit smoking', and let's learn to accept the fact that Chantix can help, but only when you are ready to help yourself as Chantix is just an aid, not a magic pill to quit smoking. |
