How does a nicotine patch work?
In: Biology
It delivers nicotine “transdermally” (across the skin barrier). Nicotine is small and can get to your bloodstream through your skin. This allows you to maintain a level of nicotine – the most significant cause of addiction – without having to smoke a cigarette. The idea is that you’ll be assisted in breaking the smoking habit by having another method of getting nicotine. This allows you to divorce the physical addiction from the habit (which is complex – social, a way of passing time, nice rituals, etc.).
Nicotine can be absorbed by the skin, the patch is soaked with it.
Patches are a great method for slow delivery systems, as skin absorption tends to be slow. They are somewhat unreliable, though, as external circumstances may affect the speed. For example, getting the patch wet or even just heavy sweating can increase it.
On the other hand, nicotine patches can be easily adjusted in strength by simply cutting them smaller.
As for nicotine absorbing through skin I have a little anecdote. My grandma was a very heavy smoker (she later died of lung cancer). I would come to her place and clean her windows sometimes, as she couldn’t really climb ladders herself. The tars from the smoke would heavily soil the windows, so when I washed them the nicotine dissolved in the washing water. It took some time to clean them all so I soaked my hands in that water for a while, getting slight nicotine overdose eventually. (I was a smoker myself at the time, so I could recognize the nicotine effects).
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