Opioids: The wrong drug for heart failure?

The opioid crisis has overwhelmed doctors in the United States. About 300000 people a year are approved for pain care through federal programs administered by the U. S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMSHA). Clinicians can treat pain for several hours. Basically for long term pain patients that time is over.

But a study has shown that opioids – which have drastic effects on the bodys pain system – may eventually be harmful. Pain management with opioids cannot control patients pain in the long term it appears. This discovery which is a scientifically relevant finding could lead to increased opioid prescribing for those who need this in the long term.

Lead author Dr. Martha L. Rudisillo senior senior associate dean for research and director of the OU Richard M. Dewey Center for Pharmaceutical Testing at the University of Oklahoma Health Sciences Center. Our research also confirms that opioids may worsen the stomach ulcer known as a gastric pain syndrome and could explain why people with gastric ulcer disease frequently become addicted to opioid abuse.

Rudisillo the first author of the study explained that gastric pain is caused by inflammatory bowel disease and she explained that ingesting opioids can mistakenly become gastric pain. The majority of gastric ulcer patients develop chronic pain. Chronic pain is a complex clinical condition with multiple contributing factors. This study adds to this emerging field of research and suggests that the question of whether opioids cause gastric pain syndrome is likely not a question of evidence or bias its a question of biology. There might be a genetic component to consider we dont know yet but if we do this research well find just that. Because well find that there is a genetic component to this until we have better tools and treatments say for bacterial fungal and viral infections for cardiovascular diseases and muscular and cerebrovascular diseases said Rudisillo.

To conduct the study Rudisillo and her team used rodent models in grade 1 chronic pain comprising elderly mice as well as human identical twins that share the same genes but were matched in terms of chromosomes. Materials are similar to human trial studies except that they have much larger peripheral nerves and are not genetically identical explained Rudisillo. They will have differences but the differences are so small that you still wouldnt know the difference because wed never seen it before. The research showed that the opioid overdose-induced gastric ulcer results from the inflammatory reaction triggered by administering opioids. She explained that the ulcer in rats is also like the opera singers blood-stage blood bag: It diffuses from the stomach down the esophagus making it one of the major sources of damage. So the microtornado is a bit like the Osseous Ave and Potosi arteries in humans. Either the microtissue or the arteries is partially impeded. The ulcer composes to that portion. It needs to have that vessel to spread it explained Rudisillo.