A FURTHER STUDY OF FTC YIELD AND NICOTINE ABSORPTION IN SMOKERS

The relationship between nicotine yield as determined by the FTC metho d and nicotine absorption was examined in 72 smokers in a more rigorou s repetition of a previous study of 33 smokers. For this study, 113 sm okers evenly distributed across four FTC ''tar'' yield ranges were rec ruited; only 72 demonstrated reasonable compliance with the study crit eria with regard to sample collections and cigarette brand style consi stency. Subjects recorded the number of cigarettes smoked daily and co llected a 24-h urine sample and a saliva sample on 3 consecutive days. Nicotine absorption was determined by monitoring urinary excretion of nicotine and its metabolites. In addition, saliva samples were monito red for cotinine using radioimmunoassay (RIA). The correlation of the relationship for nicotine absorbed per cigarette was positive and sign ificant (r = 0.31, P = 0.008) but weaker than in the previous study. O nly smokers in the highest yield range showed any statistical differen ce from smokers in the lower ranges. Our results suggest that FTC nico tine yield is weakly related to nicotine absorption and that smoker-co ntrolled factors exert a great influence on the amount of nicotine abs orbed by smelters. Compensation is substantial but incomplete for the minority (by market share) of smokers at the low end of the yield scal e. It is uncertain how well any alternative set of machine parameters would predict nicotine absorption for the majority of smokers, even if it were more predictive for the small number of smokers at the lower yield part of the range.