Barbiturate
Barbiturates in high doses are used for medical aid in dying, and in combination with a muscle relaxant for euthanasia and for capital punishment by lethal injection.
[10] The memory-impairing effects and cognitive impairments induced by sodium thiopental are thought to reduce a subject's ability to invent and remember lies.
This practice is no longer considered legally admissible in court, owing to findings that subjects undergoing such interrogations may form false memories, putting the reliability of all information obtained through such methods into question.
[12] Since this first article, different kind of receptors were designed, as well as different barbiturates and cyanurates, not for their efficiencies as drugs but for applications in supramolecular chemistry, in the conception of materials and molecular devices.
[13] In modern chemistry the barbiturates are often presented by its Hirshfeld surface representations showing its intermolecular interactions [1] calculated with CrystalExplorer Program.
As a result, people over the age of 65 are at higher risk of experiencing the harmful effects of barbiturates, including drug dependence and accidental overdose.
Mental cravings for barbiturates can last for months or years in some cases and counselling/support groups are highly encouraged by addiction specialists.
Patients should never try to tackle the task of discontinuing barbiturates without consulting a doctor, owing to the high lethality and relatively sudden onset of the withdrawal.
[citation needed] Some symptoms of an overdose typically include sluggishness, incoordination, difficulty in thinking, slowness of speech, faulty judgement, drowsiness, shallow breathing, staggering, and, in severe cases, coma or death.
This can result in fatal overdoses from drugs such as codeine, tramadol, and carisoprodol, which become considerably more potent after being metabolized by CYP enzymes.
People who are known to have killed themselves by barbiturate overdose include Stefan Zweig, Charles Boyer, Ruan Lingyu, Dalida, Jeannine Deckers, Felix Hausdorff, Abbie Hoffman, Phyllis Hyman, Carole Landis, C. P. Ramanujam, George Sanders, Jean Seberg, Lupe Vélez and the members of Heaven's Gate cult.
Others who have died as a result of barbiturate overdose include Pier Angeli, Brian Epstein, Judy Garland, Jimi Hendrix, Marilyn Monroe, Inger Stevens, Dinah Washington, Ellen Wilkinson, and Alan Wilson; in some cases these have been speculated to be suicides as well.
Those who died of a combination of barbiturates and other drugs include Rainer Werner Fassbinder, Dorothy Kilgallen, Malcolm Lowry, Edie Sedgwick and Kenneth Williams.
The direct gating or opening of the chloride ion channel is the reason for the increased toxicity of barbiturates compared to benzodiazepines in overdose.
For example, neuronal nAChR channels are blocked by clinically relevant anesthetic concentrations of both thiopental and pentobarbital.
[31] Another story holds that Baeyer synthesized the substance from the collected urine of a Munich waitress named Barbara.
[35] Barbituric acid itself does not have any direct effect on the central nervous system and chemists have derived over 2,500 compounds from it that possess pharmacologically active qualities.
Ultrashort-acting barbiturates are commonly used for anesthesia because their extremely short duration of action allows for greater control.
This is not a common practice anymore, however, owing to the dangers of long-term use of barbiturates; they have been replaced by the benzodiazepines and Z-drug such as zolpidem, zaleplon and eszopiclone for sleep.
Barbiturates in this class are not used for insomnia, because, owing to their extremely long half-life, patients would awake with a residual "hang-over" effect and feel groggy.
During World War II, military personnel in the Pacific region were given "goofballs" to improve their tolerance of the heat and humidity of daily working conditions.
This led to growing dependency problems, often exacerbated by indifferent physicians prescribing high doses to unknowing patients through the 1950s and 1960s.
[citation needed] In the late 1950s and 1960s, an increasing number of published reports of barbiturate overdoses and dependence problems led physicians to reduce their prescription, particularly for spurious requests.
[41] Other effects of barbiturate intoxication include drowsiness, lateral and vertical nystagmus, slurred speech and ataxia, decreased anxiety, and loss of inhibitions.
Barbiturates are also used to alleviate the adverse or withdrawal effects of illicit drug use, in a manner similar to long-acting benzodiazepines such as diazepam and clonazepam.
Slang terms for barbiturates include barbs, barbies, bluebirds, dolls, wallbangers, yellows, downers, goofballs, sleepers, 'reds & blues', and tooties.
[45] (it lacks oxygen at #2 position of generic barbiturate structure) (the oxygen at #2 position is replaced by a sulfur) Thiopental is a barbiturate with one of the C=O double bonds (with the carbon being labelled 2 in the adjacent diagram) replaced with a C=S double bond, R1 being CH2CH3 (ethyl) and R3) being CH(CH3)CH2CH2CH3 (sec-pentyl).
