SEDATIVES
Sedatives
constitute a large family of compounds with relaxing effects on the nervous
system. Dating back to 1846, the barbiturates are the best known.
Many barbiturates with different types of
action are available. Some, such as pentobarbital and secobarbital, are
fast-starting and short- acting, exerting their effects quickly but for a
relatively short period. Others, phenobarbital, amobarbital, and butabarbital,
are slow-starting but long-acting. Most often abused are the short-acting
compounds, commonly called goofballs and barbs. In normal, medically prescribed
doses, barbiturates mildly slow the heart rate and breathing, lower blood
pressure, and mildly depress nerve activity.
In larger
doses, they may cause confusion, slurred speech, and staggering, deep
sleep-symptoms much like those of alcoholic inebriation. Sedatives not only
produce tolerance so that increasingly greater doses are needed to achieve the
same results; they also produce physical dependence.
Their abrupt
withdrawal can lead to cramps, nausea, delirium and convulsions, and, in some
cases, sudden death. Withdrawal must be carried out in a hospital over a period
of weeks with gradual reduction of dosage. It isn't only large dosage that can
be fatal. Even a small dose may produce slowing of reaction and some distortion
of vision. Barbiturates Drugs are a major cause of automobile accidents.
The
combination of barbiturates and alcohol is especially dangerous; the two
substances have a synergistic effect in which each greatly increases the
effects of the other. Barbiturates are frequently implicated in suicides, but
they also cause many accidental deaths which only appear to be suicides.
A
major problem with barbiturates is that a user may react more strongly at one
time than another; and with a strong reaction, there may be some confusion
about how many pills have been taken and the user may groggily go on to take
more, sometimes a fatal over dosage.
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