I actually hated organic chemistry at university...

[baratron]

...but I kinda like it now. Got into pharmacology when I was desperately researching antidepressants, and I've stayed interested. (Should really look into those again - been reminded by Netdoctor that Efexor can cause raised blood cholesterol levels, and that's also a reason why people develop gallstones. Getting my blood cholesterol level checked is on my list for the week.)

I now know the official difference between an opiate and opioid. Opiates occur naturally (the medicinally useful ones are codeine and morphine), and opioids are synthesised from a starting opiate. So dihydrocodeine, Tramadol and pethidine are opioids.

I am stupidly amused. if you open the structure of codeine and dihydrocodeine as two tabs in the same window, you can rapidly click between them to make your own animated gif. Who'd've thought it - dihydrocodeine is just codeine with its double bond saturated. Huh. btw, those links are from a site calling itself Just For Chemists, which leads to deceptively simple structures for things like pethidine unless you know that Me is a methyl group (-CH₃), Et is an ethyl group (-CH₂CH₃) and Ph is a benzene ring. When I post my List of Interesting Drugs I've Taken Recently, I'll modify the structures to be complete.

omg, I've just found a link to The Synthesis of Tramadol. That rocks. Sadly, it seems to be the only one on there. I'm just... amazed... that the highly toxic-to-me salicylic acid can be reduced & Grignarded and turned into something that doesn't kill me.

And I'm even more stupidly amused to discover that I have now Officially taken a Class A Drug. Does it still count as a Class A Drug if I took it for medicinal purposes under prescription? I want to know! Are these pain attacks going to sully my "Never taken an illegal drug in my life except alcohol a few times when underage" reputation?!

Hold on a minute... according to the list of drugs on Wikipedia, codeine is a Class B drug. How the hell is something that is legally available at any UK pharmacy without prescription Class B? That list has to be screwy.

Further update: the official UK Home Office website tells me that codeine/dihydrocodeine don't count as Class B if they're in a preparation which contain less than 100mg of codeine and/or less than 2.5% codeine. Likewise, morphine injections are only Class A if the preparation contains more than 0.2% of morphine base. See for details. Annoyingly, it doesn't translate the official Government categories into media-speak - so while I know that Schedule 1 = Class A and Schedule 2 = Class B, I've no idea what Schedules 3, 4 Part 1 and 4 Part 2 are. Schedule 5 is unrestricted for sale by licensed pharmacists.

So apparently I'm up to 2 Class As (morphine and pethidine), 2 Class Bs (codeine and dihydrocodeine), and one Schedule 4 Part 1 (whatever the hell that means - Zolpidem). But the Government doesn't care because I took them legally. So all I want to know is whether I've lost purity test points (where "technicalities count")? Anyone more pedantic than me welcome to explain.

Comments

Classes and schedules

[hattifattener]

It looks like the UK regulations use the Class A / Class B terminology, the United States' domestic regulations use the Schedule I / Schedule II terminology, and the international Single Convention on Narcotic Drugs also uses the Schedule I / Schedule II terminology. I don't know how congruent all these categorizations are.

Re: Classes and schedules

[baratron.livejournal.com]

My gut feeling says that doesn't actually work, because although the UK Government's Schedule 1 equals Class A, Schedule 2 equals Class B and Schedule 5 is unclassified - unless Class C contains all of Schedules 3, 4-1 and 4-2, there's something missing. But it could be that Schedule 1, 2 and 3 drugs are always illegal except on prescription, whereas Schedule 4 drugs are only illegal if not sold by a registered pharmacy. If that makes sense. And it still doesn't work, because some of the drugs on that list are illegal even with prescription, and not only the ones in the Part 1 and Part 2 of Schedule 4. Mysterious.

[nmc.livejournal.com]

Does it still count as a Class A Drug if I took it for medicinal purposes under prescription? I want to know!

High School English Teacher: "Were you on narcotics when you wrote this paper?"
Me: "Yes."

They were legal, though, which may or may not take away from the story.

[nmc.livejournal.com]

Er, by "legal" I mean "prescribed to me for a valid reason by a doctor," said valid reason being that a team of surgeons and just opened up my ankle, sanded some stuff off the joint and drove a screw threw it, which did not qualify as "a nice, relaxing foot massage."

[elfgeek.livejournal.com]

OMG, I was given morphine this week by a nurse! I don't think I've ever had a Class A before (but I didn't feel high or anything).

Re: Classes and schedules

[hattifattener]

I think you're right; the schedules and classes and whatnot don't really correspond with each other. For example, the US's Schedule I is for drugs with no currently accepted medical use … [and] a lack of accepted safety for use, that is, drugs which are unalloyed eeeeevil (although several Schedule I drugs are in fact used medically). The US schedules and the SCND schedules are kept only vaguely in sync, and the SCND's schedules are ordered in the reverse of the US's: Schedule IV is the most restrictive, schedule I is the most general.

Hmm, and it appears that the UK has Schedule Foo (MDR 1985), which divide the drugs according to medical use, as well as Class Foo (MDA 1971), which divide the drugs according to harshness of penalty: this according to Erowid's summary.

So, basically, confusion.

[karen2205]

The codeine available from pharmacies is very reduced in strength ie. 8mg not 30mg. And it's only available in a mixture of paracetamol/ibuprofen, not on its own.

I hadn't realised pethidine was Class A - I was given it while in hospital post appendectomy.

And no, IME, taking drugs on prescription doesn't lose you purity points:-)

[mhw.livejournal.com]

Pain tends to counteract opiate euphoriant effects. That's why people who take them for pain relief often don't become psychologically dependent on them.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

I think that is the Best Story Ever. Or at least, the best one I've heard this week.

Any idea what margaret from #soc.bi is up to? I got an email from her yesterday saying she'd gone to Newcastle hospital, but I had no idea she was coming to the UK at all - it turns out that the one previous email I'd had had gone into my spam filter. If you hear from her before I do, tell her to contact me directly. Ta!

[hatter.livejournal.com]

All technicalities count.


the hatter

[(Anonymous)]

hiya i spilt innocent smootie on my laptop to and i love sims 2 yeye.

[baratron.livejournal.com]

Y'know, leaving a random comment on a journal entry from three years ago is a bit strange?