PMID: 9190849Jun 1, 1997Paper

Analgesia by dihydrocodeine is not due to formation of dihydromorphine: evidence from nociceptive activity in rat thalamus

The Journal of Pharmacology and Experimental Therapeutics
I JurnaW Fleischer

Abstract

Dihydrocodeine is increasingly used in slow-release preparations for the treatment of chronic pain on step 2 of the "analgesic ladder" of the World Health Organization. Dihydrocodeine is suggested to act after O-demethylation to dihydromorphine. To test this possibility, experiments were carried out on rats under urethane anesthesia in which nociceptive activity was evoked by electrical stimulation of afferent C fibers in the sural nerve and recorded from neurons in the ventrobasal complex of the thalamus. Dihydrocodeine administered by intravenous injection reduced the evoked nociceptive activity in a dose-dependent manner. Like morphine, dihydrocodeine was capable of completely suppressing the evoked activity. Maximum depression was caused by 2 mg/kg, and the ED50 is 0.47 mg/kg. Naloxone (0.2 mg/kg) reversed the effect of dihydrocodeine (2 mg/kg). To inhibit O-demethylation of dihydrocodeine to dihydromorphine, metyrapone or cimetidine (50 mg/kg) was injected intraperitoneally 20 min before dihydrocodeine (1 and 2 mg/kg). This failed to markedly reduce the effect of dihydrocodeine. Dihydromorphine injected intravenously also reduced the evoked activity in a dose-dependent way. Maximum depression occurred at a dose of 4 mg/kg,...Continue Reading

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