Feeling no pain: alcohol as an analgesic.
Orally administered ethyl alcohol (1 ml/kg of 100% ethyl alcohol + 1 ml/kg tonic water) (the equivalent of two cocktails) produced tolerance to experimentally induced pain comparable to 0.17 mg/kg s.q. morphine (11.6 mg in a 70 kg person) [corrected]. Pain threshold, i.e., the initial awareness of pain, was not modified by either morphine or alcohol. The experiment was run using 18 paid subjects in an experimenter-blinded design. Both a pharmacologically active placebo (atropine) as well as a totally inactive placebo (saline) were employed. Pain induction occurred via mechanical pressure on the Achilles tendon utilizing a device previously standardized in the clinical screening of over 100,000 patients for pain awareness. These results suggest that alcohol, in non-intoxicating quantities, may be an effective adjunct to other analgesic modalities.
Woodrow
Kenneth M
KM
Department of Psychiatry, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA 94305 U.S.A. Department of Anesthesia, Stanford University School of Medicine, Stanford, CA 94305 U.S.A.
Eltherington
Lorne G
LG
D000328:Adult; D000698:Analgesia; D000704:Analysis of Variance; D000431:Ethanol / Q000494:pharmacology*; D005260:Female; D006801:Humans; D010146:Pain / Q000503:physiopathology*; D012684:Sensory Thresholds
D000431:Ethanol