Ireland and colleagues conducted a study to compare the effects of ranitidine 300 mg administered at night with 150 mg ranitidine given twice a day over a 4-week period in patients with duodenal ulcers.

In this prospective double-blind study, 102 patients with endoscopically confirmed duodenal ulcers were randomized to receive either ranitidine 150 mg twice daily or 300 mg ranitidine every evening for a period of 4 weeks.

• Around 84% patients healed with ranitidine 150 mg twice daily while 96% reported healing with ranitidine 300 mg every evening (p = 0.09).
• There seemed to be no differences in the two treatment groups in terms of mean days or nights with pain or intake of antacids.

Ranitidine 300 mg single night-time dose was found to be as effective as 150 mg dose given twice a day in healing duodenal ulcers.

Source: Ireland A, Gear P, Colin-Jones DG, et al. Ranitidine 150 mg twice daily vs 300 mg nightly in treatment of duodenal ulcers. Lancet 1984;324(8397):274-276.