Opiates and cannabinoids: fighting pain

2003/03/01 Andonegi Beristain, Garazi - Elhuyar Zientziaren Komunikazioa Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Unibertsitateak
• Osasuna

Opioids and cannabinoids, besides being drugs, are drugs. In fact, opiates (morphine, methadone, etc.) They have long been used to reduce pain and many cannabinoids also have analgesic properties.

When talking about medicines, it is very important to know what happens after long-term treatments. This study with opioids and cannabinoids poses two main problems: on the one hand, being drugs they create a psychic dependence and, on the other, in the long term, physical dependence and tolerance appear.

Psychic dependence is used to designate the need to use drugs and physical dependence is a cellular adaptation. However, to these two addictions must be added tolerance, as in the case of pain. Tolerance occurs when the body gets used to the medicine and the process that eliminates pain goes away. Therefore, to achieve the same effect, that is, to eliminate pain, it is necessary to increase the dose to the patient.

Solution hypothesis

According to the Leioa research group, one of the keys can be nitric oxide (NO) to solve opioid and cannabinoid problems as drugs. Nitric oxide is a gaseous neurotransmitter in the brain. According to the researchers, the administration of nitric oxide inhibitors along with opiates and cannabinoids would prevent tolerance and dependence and, in addition, the therapeutic effect would not be lost.

Some results confirm the hypothesis, although the conclusions are less clear. The study of nitric oxide inhibitors has shown that they partially impede tolerance, but in turn raise tension. These inhibitors not only affect the brain, so they have other side effects. In view of this, it is only about finding inhibitors that would act on the brain.

Opiates for a long time, but for when?

The research being carried out in Leioa is novel in many ways. In fact, although opiates have been used and studied for some time, their mechanism of action is still to be elucidated, and very little research has been done with cannabinoids.

Therefore, the research team will mainly study opioids, morphine. The opioid study will analyze the effects of nitric oxide inhibitors on nerve activity and pain. To do this, they will analyze neuronal activity in the different areas (locus coeruleus and spinal cord) and, measuring the pain reflex, will check if you feel less or more pain. In addition, the recipients of the reserve and their pharmacodynamic characteristics will be validated.

The latest studies will be conducted with cannabinoids. The aim is to check the influence of cannabinoids on the locus coeruleus and then to measure the tolerance of this effect.

• The project is entitled
  Neurobiological mechanisms involved in reliance on analgesics: influence of nitric oxide on opioid and cannabinoid tolerance.
• Objective
  To analyze the influence of nitric oxide on adaptation mechanisms in which tolerance to opioid and cannabinoid methods occurs.
• Principal Investigator Joseba
  Pineda Ortiz.
• 
  Mª I working group. Ulibarri, M. Torrecilla, M. Santamarta, A. Mendiguren, J. Crying.
• DepartmentPharmacology.
  
• • Faculty
  of Medicine and Dentistry (Leioa)
• •
  Science and Technology