At the E-cig Summit, Professor Konstantinos Farsalinos summarized the events of 2016 through the eyes of the scientific community. He also explained his plans to neutralize the trends that are expected to be amplified in the coming year.
2016: Number of vaping studies increases, including poor quality studies
Professor Konstantinos Farsalinos, cardiologist at the Onassis Surgical Center in Greece, is the author of several scientific papers and a recently published book. He is also a member of the editorial board for several scientific journals.
Professor Farsalinos speaks at the E-Cig Summit
Researchers note that each year, along with the growing popularity of e-cigarettes, comes a huge number of accompanying studies, some of which are of poor quality.
However, for non-scientists, even fully qualified scientists, it is difficult to distinguish between high-quality and low-quality research on the subject. E-cigarettes remain a hot topic, and they generate a lot of headlines and research topics.
Professor Farsalinos is troubled by the fact that many of the studies are designed to generate media attention. In these articles, the framing is designed to expose some harm, but the harm is not necessarily representative of reality. The most prominent example is the constant denial of the dry puff phenomenon (also known as dry hit, dry burn), which is a phenomenon where the device overheats and burns the cotton, resulting in a terrible tasting e-liquid that most vapers try to avoid.
Dry puff, a problem often repeated in scientific literature
Although the scientific community has known about this problem since 2013, when Professor K. Farsalinos published the first study, warning about the consequences of dry puffs based on their emissions and toxicity, the researcher found that there are still many other researchers who believe that this is just an assumption. Those researchers have conducted related studies without ensuring that those dry puffs are not created in the laboratory. From a scientific perspective, the results are correct, but they do not represent the practical application of e-cigarettes.
This lack of consideration for the phenomenon has led to many studies that have shown large amounts of toxicity, but they are inaccurate, because no vaper can be exposed to the type of use that leads to such consequences. “Studies like this will definitely appear in the future,” predicts Professor K. Farsalinos, and he has a plan to help researchers who are wasting time proving it by replicating the method and comparing the results to eliminate poor quality studies and misleading media campaigns.
The “long-time user” and “thirty-day trial user” problem
Another problem is the misunderstanding of the concept of regular vapers, which considers those who try e-cigarettes and those who use them for about thirty days as regular vapers. This misunderstanding has led to an underestimation of the potential and effectiveness of e-cigarettes for people who want to quit smoking.
“Testing alone cannot draw any conclusions. Studies should focus on regular vapers, and this is the only way to highlight the true impact of e-cigarettes, whether good or bad.”
- Professor K. Farsalinos
It is important to identify the correct use of e-cigarettes and discuss regular users with those who are just experimenting, as no one will quit smoking after only trying e-cigarettes once or twice.
This article was published on Vapingpost by Jérôme Harlay and translated by The Vape Club
