Full Length Research Paper

Salivary nicotine and cotinine concentrations in unstimulated and stimulated saliva

N. Robson¹*, A. J Bond² and K. Wolff²

¹University Malaya, Department of Primary Care Medicine, Faculty of Medicine, University Malaya, 50603, Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia.

²King’s College London, Institute of Psychiatry, London SE5 8AF, United Kingdom.

*Corresponding author. E-mail: noorzurani@um.edu.my. Tel: + 6017 2005468. Fax: + 603 79577941.

 Abstract

Salivary nicotine and cotinine are widely used in clinical and epidemiological studies to validate smoking cessation. However, the reported collection for salivary nicotine and cotinine vary by technique and duration. This study investigated the influence of salivary collection by unstimulation and stimulation technique of the concentration of salivary nicotine and cotinine. It was found that unstimulated technique produced the highest salivary nicotine concentration, whereas stimulated technique produced the highest salivary cotinine concentration. The results of this study suggest that it is important to standardise salivary nicotine and cotinine collection technique.