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Tag: PATH

  • Westat to Continue Supporting PATH Study

    Westat to Continue Supporting PATH Study

    Image: Andrii Yalanskyi

    The U.S. National Institutes of Health’s National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA) and the Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Tobacco Products have announced the award of a third contract to Westat to continue to support the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) Study. Westat has supported the study since its inception in 2011.

    The PATH Study is a uniquely large, long-term study of tobacco use and health in the United States. It provides the ability to follow participants over time, looking at how and why people start, continue, discontinue and re-start using tobacco. It examines how the use of different tobacco products affects health, including cardiovascular and respiratory health. Findings help inform FDA’s actions related to tobacco products under the Family Smoking Prevention and Tobacco Control Act.

    Westat’s team includes hundreds of experts—tobacco regulatory scientists, survey statisticians and methodologists, data and biospecimen collection experts, data scientists and IT staff, along with experienced field interviewers—who have contributed to the PATH Study for many years in collaboration with distinguished academic organizations and industry-leading operational subcontractors.

    “Our work will build on the knowledge we have gained during the past 12 years of supporting the PATH Study and a foundation of over 35 years of tobacco research,” said PATH Study Project Director Charles Carusi in a statement. “We are honored to continue this work and enhance and extend the PATH Study’s impact on tobacco regulatory science while meeting NIDA’s and FDA’s need for sound science.”

  • Latest PATH Data Files Released

    Latest PATH Data Files Released

    Photo: Tobacco Reporter Archive

    The U.S. Food and Drug Administration’s Center for Tobacco Products and the National Institute of Health’s National Institute on Drug Abuse announced the availability and location of newly released and updated data files from the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) Study, including the following:

    New data sets:

    Updated datasets:

    The Wave 5.5 Special Collection data were collected from youth participants ages 13 to 19 between July and December 2020. Data in the PATH-ATS were collected between September and December 2020 from a subsample of adult participants ages 20 and older, complementing the Wave 5.5 Special Collection. Additionally, Restricted-Use Files have been updated to include Wave 5 Ever/Never Reference Data, and the Restricted-Use and Public-Use Master Linkage Files have been updated.

    Questions about the collection, content, weighting, documentation, or structure of PATH Study data (this excludes questions on statistical analysis or analytic guidance) may be submitted to PATHDataUserQuestions@Westat.com.

  • Researchers Invited to Access PATH Data

    Researchers Invited to Access PATH Data

    Photo: lucadp

    The U.S. Food and Drug Administration is encouraging researchers to access recently published numbers on tobacco consumption.

    In March, the agency’s Center for Tobacco Products, together with the National Institutes of Health, released the first set of widely available Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) study tables and figures that provide information on tobacco use among youth (aged 12-17), young adults (aged 18-24), and adults (aged 25+).

    The content, which is available for public use, may be downloaded from the PATH Study webpage, which also provides information about the analytic methods used to generate the tables and figures.   

    The PATH Study is a uniquely large, long-term study of tobacco use and health in the United States. By following study participants over time, the PATH Study helps scientists learn how and why people start using tobacco, quit using it, and start using it again after they’ve quit, as well as how different tobacco products affect health over time.

  • Study Claims Patches Better Than Vapes

    Study Claims Patches Better Than Vapes

    Credit: kues1

    A new study claims that those using e-cigarettes to quit smoking found them to be less helpful than more traditional smoking cessations aids such as patches and gum.

    The study, published Monday in the journal BMJ, analyzed the latest 2017 to 2019 data from the Population Assessment of Tobacco and Health (PATH) Study, which follows tobacco use among Americans over time.

    “This is the first time we found e-cigarettes to be less popular than FDA-approved pharmaceutical aids, such as medications or the use of patches, gum, or lozenges,” said John Pierce, the director for population sciences at the Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego, according to CNN.

    A three-month randomized trial in the United Kingdom, published in 2019, found e-cigarettes, along with behavioral interventions, did help smokers quit tobacco cigarettes. In guidance published in late 2021, the UK National Institute for Health and Care Excellence decided to recommend that smokers use e-cigarettes to help them quit.

    Another recent study, published in JAMA Network Open, found adult smokers with no plans to quit are more likely to stop smoking if they switch to daily vaping, according to new research led by Roswell Park Comprehensive Cancer Center.

    The Roswell Park study also used data collected from 2014 to 2019 as part of the PATH study.