naloxone and Respiration-Disorders

Forty cancer patients were randomly assigned to two groups (n = 20). All had incapacitating pain unresponsive to the usual non opioid analgesic drugs. An epidural catheter was set up at the level of the most painful metamere, and made to pass subcutaneously so as to exit either in the supraclacicular fossa, or on the patient's flank. At T0, the patients were given 4 mg morphine hydrochloride diluted in 10 ml normal saline. Thirty min later, patients in the naloxone group (group N) were given a 0.4 mg bolus, followed by a constant rate infusion of 5 micrograms.kg-1.h-1, of naloxone hydrochloride during 18 h. Patients in group P (placebo) were given normal saline instead. The degree of pain was studied with a visual analogue scale and analgesia was assessed by a clinician on a five point scale. These two parameters were obtained half an hour after the injection of morphine and 2, 4, 6 and 24 hours later. At the same time, the patients were questioned about adverse side-effects: nausea, vomiting, pruritus, dysuria, urinary retention. Respiratory depression was assessed clinically and biologically (blood gas measurements at the afore mentioned times). Heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure were also measured. There was no statistically significant difference between the groups in quality and duration of analgesia. Pain reached its lowest level 4 h after the injection of morphine, returning to half its original value at the 24th h. This was also true for the incidence of nausea (11 in group N, 5 in group P), vomiting (3 in both groups), and urinary retention (6 in group P, 5 in group N).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Topics: Adult; Aged; Analgesia, Epidural; Chronic Disease; Double-Blind Method; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Morphine; Naloxone; Nausea; Neoplasms; Pain; Pain Measurement; Pruritus; Respiration Disorders; Urinary Retention; Vomiting

Forty cancer patients were randomly assigned to two groups (n = 20). All had incapacitating pain unresponsive to the usual non opioid analgesic drugs. An epidural catheter was set up at the level of the most painful metamere, and made to pass subcutaneously so as to exit either in the supraclacicular fossa, or on the patient's flank. At T0, the patients were given 4 mg morphine hydrochloride diluted in 10 ml normal saline. Thirty min later, patients in the naloxone group (group N) were given a 0.4 mg bolus, followed by a constant rate infusion of 5 micrograms.kg-1.h-1, of naloxone hydrochloride during 18 h. Patients in group P (placebo) were given normal saline instead. The degree of pain was studied with a visual analogue scale and analgesia was assessed by a clinician on a five point scale. These two parameters were obtained half an hour after the injection of morphine and 2, 4, 6 and 24 hours later. At the same time, the patients were questioned about adverse side-effects: nausea, vomiting, pruritus, dysuria, urinary retention. Respiratory depression was assessed clinically and biologically (blood gas measurements at the afore mentioned times). Heart rate, systolic and diastolic blood pressure were also measured. There was no statistically significant difference between the groups in quality and duration of analgesia. Pain reached its lowest level 4 h after the injection of morphine, returning to half its original value at the 24th h. This was also true for the incidence of nausea (11 in group N, 5 in group P), vomiting (3 in both groups), and urinary retention (6 in group P, 5 in group N).(ABSTRACT TRUNCATED AT 250 WORDS)

Topics: Adult; Aged; Analgesia, Epidural; Chronic Disease; Double-Blind Method; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Morphine; Naloxone; Nausea; Neoplasms; Pain; Pain Measurement; Pruritus; Respiration Disorders; Urinary Retention; Vomiting

Topics: Analgesics, Opioid; Anesthesia, General; Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; Female; Fentanyl; Flunitrazepam; Humans; Male; Naloxone; Pentazocine; Respiration Disorders

The postoperative respiratory depressant effect of fentanyl in combination with flunitrazepam (Rohypnol) was assessed in awake and in unconscious patients. In awake patients respiratory function was measured with blood-gas analyses. For measurements in unconscious patients the administration of nitrous oxide/oxygen was continued postoperatively and the respiratory depression was judged from the increase in respiratory minute volume after the i.v. administration of 0.05 mg naloxone (Narcan). In the group of awake patients blood-gasvalues were within the normal range after anaesthesia with flunitrazepam (1 mg) and fentanyl (0.80 mcg/kg body weight/10 min anaesthesia; last fentanyl given 40 min before the end of the operation), and the administration of naloxone was without any effect. If, however, naloxone was given while the patients were kept under light nitrous oxide/oxygen anaesthesia, the effect was different. The respiratory minute volume was considerably less than its predicted value in all groups of patients having received fentanyl, and naloxone caused a marked increase in respiratory minute volume and in respiratory rate. In a group of patients which have received no opiate but enflurane, naloxone showed no effect. After premedication with pethidine as compared with flunitrazepam the effect of naloxone on ventilation was more pronounced. This marked difference in the postoperative effect of fentanyl on ventilation depending on the state of consciousness has to be attributed to an interaction between a residual respiratory depressant effect of fentanyl and the effect of unconsciousness. Since after the combined use of flunitrazepam and fentanyl deep postoperative sleep occurs quite frequent, a residual effect of fentanyl should always be antagonized with naloxone to protect the patients from a possible hazardous effect of this interaction.

Topics: Adolescent; Adult; Aged; Anesthesia, General; Fentanyl; Flunitrazepam; Humans; Meperidine; Middle Aged; Naloxone; Pulmonary Ventilation; Respiration Disorders; Unconsciousness; Wakefulness

Topics: Anesthesia, General; Aorta; Blood Gas Analysis; Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; Fentanyl; Humans; Naloxone; Respiration Disorders

After administration of fentanyl, 0.15 mg naloxone or levallorphan or placebo were given several times and in increased doses and at same intervals of time to six volunteers. The experiment has been done after the rules of a double blind study. Naloxone has shown its superiority to levallorphan. The study demonstrated a faster and better action of naloxone in the way of a return to initial conditions of respiratory frequency, blood gases, and EEG. The concentration and attention faculties after naloxone have become clearly better in contrary to the results after levallorphan. At the end of an anaesthetic procedure, the greatest care should be given to the patient. First of all effective antagonism of the respiratory depression should be obtained without concomitant sedative and psychomimetic effects. The use of antagonists with agonist properties to reverse respiratory depression due to a morphinomimetic drug is not justified and so naloxone should supplant levallorphan.

Topics: Adult; Arrhythmias, Cardiac; Blood Gas Analysis; Double-Blind Method; Fentanyl; Humans; Levallorphan; Male; Naloxone; Psychological Tests; Respiration Disorders

Topics: Adult; Analgesics; Humans; Naloxone; Narcotic Antagonists; Narcotics; Pain; Respiration Disorders

We describe the experience of the acute pain service of the University Hospital of Galicia, Spain since its inception. We have treated 1214 patients using either patient-controlled analgesia (PCA) with morphine (72%), or patient-controlled epidural analgesia with fentanyl + bupivacaine (22%). Three hundred and five patients had minor complications, mainly pruritus (35%) in patients with patient-controlled epidural analgesia. Three (0.33%) patients using PCA had respiratory depression treated with naloxone; no patient with patient-controlled epidural analgesia had respiratory depression. In our experience the creation of an acute pain service and the associated development of pain-treatment protocols and the training of hospital personnel produced excellent results.

Topics: Academic Medical Centers; Analgesia, Epidural; Analgesia, Patient-Controlled; Bupivacaine; Fentanyl; Hospitals, University; Humans; Infusion Pumps; Monitoring, Physiologic; Morphine; Naloxone; Pain Clinics; Pain Measurement; Pain, Postoperative; Pruritus; Respiration; Respiration Disorders; Spain

The effects of the cholecystokinin antagonist devazepide on analgesia and respiratory depression induced by morphine in squirrel monkeys were examined. Pain thresholds were determined using the tail withdrawal procedure, in which monkeys restrained in chairs kept their tails in cool (35 degrees C) water for at least 20 sec, but withdrew them from warm (55 degrees C) water in less than 4 sec. Morphine produced a dose-related increase in tail withdrawal latencies from warm water. Devazepide (injected i.p. or p.o.) had no effect on tail withdrawal latencies when given alone but enhanced the analgesic effects of morphine. The devazepide dose-response curve for morphine enhancement was bell-shaped with doses of 3, 10, 30 and 100 micrograms/kg injected i.p. increasing morphine analgesia whereas higher and lower dose did not. In a separate group of monkeys, morphine produced dose-dependent decreases in respiratory rate and oxygen tension and increases in carbon dioxide tension. In contrast to its effects on morphine analgesia, devazepide had no effect on the various indices of morphine-induced respiratory depression. These data suggest that devazepide may have therapeutic utility as an adjuvant to morphine analgesia allowing lower dose of the opiate to be used to relieve pain and reducing the risk of opiate-induced respiratory depression.

Topics: Administration, Oral; Analgesia; Animals; Benzodiazepinones; Cholecystokinin; Devazepide; Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; Drug Synergism; Injections, Intraperitoneal; Male; Morphine; Naloxone; Pain; Pain Measurement; Receptors, Cholecystokinin; Respiration Disorders; Saimiri

Topics: Adolescent; Adult; Alfentanil; Fentanyl; Humans; Male; Naloxone; Respiration Disorders; Respiration, Artificial; Spinal Fusion

Topics: Acute Kidney Injury; Adult; Female; Humans; Kidney; Kidney Calculi; Naloxone; Opium; Postoperative Complications; Respiration Disorders

Dezocine in equianalgesic intravenous doses depressed respiratory response to CO2 breathing of six healthy subjects to approximately the same degree as morphine but with a more rapid onset and higher peak depression. The depression was dose related up to 30 mg/70 kg but was not increased by an additional 10 mg/70 kg dose. Its duration of effect was approximately the same as that of morphine. Respiratory depression by dezocine was promptly and almost completely antagonized by 0.4 mg naloxone, but antagonism lasted less than 1 hr. Healthy subjects found dezocine less pleasant than morphine and after large doses reported sensations suggestive of psychotomimetic effects. A ceiling effect for respiratory depression has now been demonstrated for three agonist-antagonist analgesics: nalorphine, nalbuphine, and dezocine. It is not yet clear to what extent this is a general characteristic of agonist-antagonist analgesics.

Topics: Adult; Bridged Bicyclo Compounds, Heterocyclic; Carbon Dioxide; Cycloparaffins; Dose-Response Relationship, Drug; Humans; Injections, Intravenous; Male; Morphine; Nalbuphine; Naloxone; Respiration Disorders; Tetrahydronaphthalenes

Alfentanil was compared with fentanyl in a double blind study of 90 female patients undergoing laparoscopic sterilizations. The analgesic was combined with droperidol and etomidate for induction and with etomidate, nitrous oxide and occasional increments of succinylcholine for maintenance of anesthesia. Twenty-four percent of the patients required reversal of postoperative respiratory depression after fentanyl compared with 7% after alfentanil (p = 0.042). When the last dose of analgesic had been given more than 10 minutes before the end of the operation, none of the alfentanil patients required reversal of respiratory depression while under the same circumstances 26% of the fentanyl patients required naloxone (p = 0.005). Awakening was delayed in all patients, exceeding a mean time of 20 minutes in both groups. However, 84% of patients were alert on awakening after alfentanil compared with 62% of patients after fentanyl (p = 0.032). Duration and quality of postoperative analgesia were similar in both groups. Cardio-vascular stability was satisfactory in all patients and side effects were minor and infrequent.

Topics: Adult; Alfentanil; Analgesics, Opioid; Anesthesia; Double-Blind Method; Female; Fentanyl; Hemodynamics; Humans; Naloxone; Postoperative Complications; Respiration Disorders

Topics: Adult; Aged; Female; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Naloxone; Narcotics; Neuroleptanalgesia; Respiration Disorders

Topics: Analgesics, Opioid; Humans; Levallorphan; Nalorphine; Naloxone; Respiration Disorders

Topics: Adolescent; Adult; Aged; Anesthesia, General; Drug Evaluation; Female; Fentanyl; Humans; Male; Middle Aged; Naloxone; Partial Pressure; Respiration Disorders; Venous Pressure