New research suggests brain activity can predict one's chance of having a relapse after quiting smoking, and the finding could potentially lead to new treatments for smokers.
Researchers found smokers who relapse within seven days of their target quit date shows signs of disruptions working memory system during abstinence that were not seen in those who successfully quit, Penn Medicine reported. The findings could help distinguish which hopeful quitters will be successful, and even act as a "therapeutic target" for new treatments.
"This is the first time abstinence-induced changes in the working memory have been shown to accurately predict relapse in smokers," said senior author Caryn Lerman, PhD a professor of Psychiatry and director of Penn's Center for Interdisciplinary Research on Nicotine Addiction who also serves as deputy director of Penn's Abramson Cancer Center.
Neural activity was found to decrease in the part of the brain that deals with self-control and increase in the region responsible for promoting an "introspective" state."
"The neural response to quitting even after one day can give us valuable information that could inform new and existing personalized intervention strategies for smokers, which is greatly needed." Indeed, smoking in the U.S. is at an all-time low in adults; however, there are still 42 million Americans who do smoke, including teenagers and young adults.
To make their findings the researchers used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to see how brief abstinence from smoking influenced memory and its associated neural activation. A research team looked at 80 smokers between the ages of 18 and 65 who reported smoking more than 10 cigarettes per day for at least a period of six months.
The participants underwent two fMRI sessions: one right after a person smoked a cigarette and one after a 24 hour abstinence period. The patients were then given smoking cessation counseling and made a target quit date. Seven days after that quit date they had a monitoring visit to see if they had relapsed. Sixty-one of the smokers relapsed and 19 successfully quit during the study period.
While neuroimaging assessments for smokers is not currently economically feasible, the findings could help identify targets for smoking cessation.
"In addition...predictive models can identify therapeutic targets for pharmacotherapies or neuroscience-based nonpharmacologic interventions to promote smoking cessation," the researchers wrote.
The findings were published in a recent edition of the journal Neuropsychopharmacology.
