Authors: Joanna L Hill James P Zacny
Publish Date: 2000/07/26
Volume: 152, Issue: 1, Pages: 31-39
Abstract
Rationale The psychopharmacological profile of hydromorphone an opioid that has been used extensively for many years for postoperative pain management has not been adequately characterized in nondrug abusers Objectives To characterize the subjective psychomotor and physiological effects of a range of single doses of hydromorphone in nondrugabusing volunteers and to compare the effects of hydromorphone with that of morphine a benchmark mu opioid agonist Methods Subjects in a sixsession study were injected in an upper extremity vein with 0 033 065 13 mg/70 kg hydromorphone and 5 and 10 mg/70 kg morphine using a randomized doubleblind crossover design Results Hydromorphone increased scores on the pentobarbitalchlorpromazinealcohol group and lysergic acid diethylamide scales and decreased scores on the benzedrine group scale of the Addiction Research Center Inventory increased adjective checklist ratings of dry mouth flushing and nodding and increased visual analog scale ratings indicative of both pleasant eg drug liking and unpleasant eg feel bad effects The subjective effects of morphine at putatively equianalgesic doses to those of hydromorphone were similar to those of hydromorphone but in some cases of lesser magnitude Psychomotor impairment was modest with hydromorphone and absent with morphine Both opioids produced dosedependent decreases in pupil size A relative potency analysis indicated that hydromorphone was 10 times as potent as morphine 1 mg hydromorphone=10 mg morphine Conclusions The results of this study demonstrate that 033–13 mg hydromorphone had orderly doserelated effects on subjective psychomotor and physiological variables and similar effects to those of a benchmark mu opioid agonist morphine
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