Cocaine is rapidly and extensively metabolized. Studies with 3H-labeled cocaine have demonstrated that the drug is biotransformed to at least ten metabolites in the rat, with the concentration of unchanged cocaine in the urine being less than 10% that of the metabolite benzoylecgonine [1]. Information on the metabolism and excretion of cocaine in man is limited. Montesinos [2] has reviewed investigations performed in the 1950s and 1960s on chewers of coca leaf. However, these studies not only used analytical methods less specific and sensitive than those available today, but also employed routes of administration different from those currently used for therapy [3] or abuse. Although several recent investigations have demonstrated that cocaine is extensively metabolized to benzoylecgonine in man [4,5] and that plasma cocaine levels diminish rapidly [6], knowledge concerning the extent and rate of metabolism and excretion of parent drug and metabolite is almost nonexistent. Wallace et al [7] measured the urinary excretion of cocaine and benzoylecgonine in ten patients who had been administered cocaine hydrochloride prior to rhinoplastic surgery. These studies were limited to the initial 24 h after drug administration and consisted of three consecutive 8-h collective specimens per patient. It was observed that the excretion of cocaine and benzoylecgonine diminishes rapidly, that benzoylecgonine concentrations in urine consistently exceeded the corresponding cocaine concentrations by a significant amount, and that the benzoylecgonine/cocaine ratios of urine concentrations varied significantly, demonstrating the impracticability of attempting to predict cocaine concentrations from benzoylecgonine data, or conversely.
Based on the data presented here and the clinical observations cited it would appear that although haloperidol has been used with a certain degree of success for the treatment of acute alcohol abstinence the authors would like to caution the clinician against widespread use of heloperidol for treatment of alcohol withdrawal. In experimentally induced ethanol withdrawal, chlordiazepoxide appears to be a more effective and safer agent for ameliorating symptoms associated with excitation such as tremor, insomnia, anxiety, and hyperexcitability. A double blind comparative clinical investigation between chlordiazepoxide and haloperidol for treatment of alcohol withdrawal is warranted.
ures shown in Table VII are obtained (C13, Cn, C9 cardanols have not been taken into account). The total derivable cardanol (83.56%) is slightly higher than if only the C15 component had been considered. Expressed in terms of the same % cardol (14.34%), the total (C15 and C17) cardanol is 85.41%.Pillay (20) thought that "a thorough diagnosis of CNSL by all known instrumental methods is still to come". The stationary phase PEGA used in the present method for the component phenols and also in the TLC/GLC method for the unsaturated constituents (13) provides a general method for the total analysis of CNSL and for the study of component phenols and their unsaturated constituents in other phenolic species.
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