Morphine Relief Without Addiction?

Roland Piquepaille writes "Morphine has been used as a painkiller for decades, if not centuries. Unfortunately for patients, morphine is also an addictive substance. Now, Brigham Young University (BYU) chemists are using a vine plant that grows in Australia to develop a new painkilling molecule, but with fewer side effects. The Deseret Morning News reports that the BYU chemists hope to ease pain with hasubanonine, the synthetic compound they created and which has a similar molecular structure as morphine. Still, more tests need to be done before this natural drug can replace morphine."

Comments

Heroin

[snowgirl]

If I recall correctly, Heroin was originally designed the same way, or at least to help people get off of a morphine addiction.

Oops! It turned out to be even more addictive, oh well, let's try again. hehe

Re:Heroin

[grandgator]

That's not exactly right, but it's close. All opiates (and opiOIDS) work primarily by binding the mu receptor in both the peripheral and central nervous systems. After that point, there is still a lot of unknown in what actually happens with respect to specific signaling cascades, etc. But that's not a result of lack of understanding regarding the pharmacology of opiates/opioids, but rather a lack of understanding what actual biochemical signals/processes/cascades are responsible for producing "pain."

The actual addiction part is not just from what happens to various levels of chemicals when you apply and then remove the drug, but to a larger extent is caused by what actually happens to the number/density of receptors themselves. A difficult problem to combat.

The problem, as many other posts here about heroin and morphine allude to, is that any compound that works via these receptors will cause similar addictive effects. The only way to avoid that it to change the way that the drug targets receptors. But, if you do that, then it's not really fair to have this article. i.e., it would then make about as much sense to say "Pepto Bismol relieves stomach pain without the addictive effects of heroin!" In other words - duh! They're not the same thing.

The reason the mu receptor is a common pain medicine target is because it is SO effective at block pain signals. But, as with so many other things posted here, there is no free lunch. You want big time pain relief? Mu receptors are the way to go. But that means issues with addiction/withdrawal/etc.

Next up: Fire that doesn't burn you!

[user9918277462]

Painkillers (opioid painkillers, specifically) are addictive precisely because of their analgesic effects. Addiction and analgesia are not separate traits, but rather two aspects of the same action. Anything that provides strong central pain relief (as opposed to peripheral analgesia as in NSAIDs) has at least some risk of causing psychological or physical dependence.

Re:Next up: Fire that doesn't burn you!

[Pedrito]

Painkillers (opioid painkillers, specifically) are addictive precisely because of their analgesic effects.

Don't confuse addiction with habit. Addiction is a physical dependency and that aspect doesn't necessarily have any relation to its analgesic effect. Aspirin has analgesic properties, but NO addictive qualities.

What makes opioids addictive is unknown. What makes them analgesic is, to some degree, understood. The two may be linked, but because something is analgesic does not make it addictive. It may be "habit-forming", on the other hand. Marijuana, for example, can be habit-forming, but it is not addictive because one does not develop a physical dependence on the presence of the drug in their system.

Re:Next up: Fire that doesn't burn you!

[Baddas]

Read the grandparent again. Asprin is a drug that acts very similarly to NSAIDs, which he SPECIFICALLY disclaimed

Marijuana is a non sequitur, he's talking about central nervous system analgesics.

Try that one again, this time, with reading comprehension.

For reference:
Asprin: peripheral analgesic
Heroin: central analgesic
Ibuprofen: peripheral analgesic
Oxycodone: central analgesic.

See a pattern here? pethidine, oxycodone, hydrocodone, diamorphine, fentanyl, basically anything that is inhibited by a mu antagonist is going to get you addicted if you take it long enough.

Morphine doesnt stop pain

[Anonymous Coward]

as someone who was recently in hospital and had morphine (and as a person who has done just about every drug there is) i can say it doesnt actually _stop_ the pain it just makes you not care about it, but it was still there even when wasted out of my skull it just makes you not care

now a painkiller that would actually take away pain would iam sure be welcomed

Re:Morphine doesnt stop pain

[saleenS281]

I'm gonna go ahead and guess that it just wasn't effective on you because of your aforementioned other drug "experiments". It turns out things like morphine are basically worthless to ex-crack addicts because they've built up an immunity/tolerance to things that take away pain for most of us.

As someone who was also recently in the hospital, and also recently had morphine, it most definitely takes away the pain.

Hardly a new concept

[slapyslapslap]

There are several companies out there with similar meds in trials. Pain Therapeutics, Inc. http://www.paintrials.com/ is doing this.

Medical comments:

[olddoc]

I am an Anesthesiologist. I give people morhine and fentanyl on a daily basis.
Morphine is a natural drug, it comes from a plant. Cocaine, digitalis, aspirin and many other drugs are also natural.
If the new drug is related to morphine I take that to mean it will work on the same receptors in the brain.
If it does, it will have a similar side effect profile: constipation, nausea, respiratory depression and probably addictive potential.
To me, this is just a "me too" drug like Tagamet/Zantac/Pepcid that all work the same way on the same receptors.

Interestingly, there is no profit margin in simple morphine. The cost to the hospital for an ampule that would relieve severe pain is on the order of $1.
The DEA paperwork is a bigger cost to a hospital!

The biggest long term problem for people who take morhine (or heroin in the UK or oxycontin or any drug in this class) is constipation.
Cancer patients don't have to worry about addiction.

Re:Medical comments:

[asuffield]

Morphine is a natural drug, it comes from a plant.

Since we haven't yet invented a practical form of transmutation or energy-matter conversion, everything is 'natural', in that it is made from things extracted from plants, animals, or rocks. 'Natural' is an emotive word with no scientific meaning.

Somewhat more to the point, drugs roughly equivalent to morphine (endorphins) are naturally produced by the body on its own, without any external intervention. You can even get addicted to them, if you can be bothered to engage in the heavy exercise necessary (many serious athletes become mildly addicted, and yes, it's real addiction - they show physical withdrawal symptoms if they stop exercising regularly, just like with any other opiate, and can occasionally require medical treatment to manage this if an injury prevents them from training). In no sense can you call an opiate, or any quantity of an opiate, 'unnatural'. It's a fundamental part of how the human body/mind operates (including everything from chocolate to orgasm).

People need to find something less pointless to talk about than whether something is 'natural'.

Do editors read? Roland Piquepaill gets a pass?

[lax-goalie]

In the next to last sentence: "the synthetic compound they created".

In the last sentence: "this natural drug".

Ummm, those two phrases are the complete opposite of each other...

From the F'ing article:

We've synthesized a mixture of the two mirror-image compounds, the idea being we can take the mirror image of the natural one

Mirror image of the "natural one". Sounds like a "synthetic compound" to me...

Across the Big Pond

[Doc Ruby]

How fortunate that tribal Africans spent thousands of years breeding ibogaine for an opiate withdrawal/detox remedy.

Re:Natural drug?

[Anonymous Coward]

You are, in fact, wrong. Morphine is produced by being extracted - not synthesized - from opium. It's made by the poppies, and the people only have to purify it. Synthesis is technically possible, and the morphine synthesis was an important milestone in organic chemistry, but that's because of the scientific insights it involved; synthesis is not the normal production process for morphine. You're probably thinking of heroin, which is synthesized using morphine as starting material.

Source with Images

[nmb3000]

Interesting that neither the summary nor the article links to the page at BYU's NewsNet page. It has a few more details, links to other sources, a video, and pictures related to the research.

Actually, Most People Don't Become Addicted

[Anonymous Coward]

There is a small fraction of the population that doesn't get hooked on morphine and its derivatives.

This is misleading. Actually, the vast majority of individuals who use opioids do not develop addiction. Everyone develops physical dependence and it's important to understand the difference. While physical dependence requires that long term opiate users taper thier dose of a long period of time, addiction (psychological dependence) occurs in only a few percent of opiate users.

Opiate addiction is similar to alcoholism. The vast majority of alcohol users will never experience addiction disorder.

For two years I took 60mg of time release morphine (Avinza) for fibromyalgia. Personally, it was much more difficult to quit drinking coffee than it was to taper off morphine (using oxycodone to taper).