Pain Relief Without Side Effects and Addiction

[hlthe2b]

2. Promising, but there is already a tendency to combine multiples of these neuroactive chemicals

in both human and veterinary medicine (in the latter for purposes of anxiety reduction as much as pain reduction). While some of these can reduce the perception of pain (e.g., gabapentin, amantadine, clonidine) and are not specifically the types of neurochemicals that interact negatively with some of the other pain meds, when combined with others (e.g, serotonin reuptake inhibitors like Prozac or tricyclic antidepressives (e.g., trazodone) that likewise modulate serotonin) serious complications can arise. Such a combination use is meant to improve duration times or to reduce the need for NSAIDs, much less, opiates, but has a potential for some potentially deadly combined toxicity (e.g., serotonin syndrome).

So, as much as I look forward to more of these advances, I sincerely hope there will be less tendency to pursue the "full spectrum pharmacology" approach that combines these drugs all too "willy nilly." I see this now. I've seen deaths as a result.