Psychology & Psychiatry

The soothing effects of strangers

Is pain treatment more helpful if it is provided by a friend, or is the help of a stranger better? A study conducted by researchers from the Universities of Wuerzburg, Amsterdam and Zurich investigated this question and found ...

Diseases, Conditions, Syndromes

COVID-19 diagnosed in 0.1 percent of neonates

Few neonates have severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2 infection, and most are asymptomatic or develop mild illness, according to a study published online Aug. 23 in Pediatrics.

Medications

Opioids produce analgesia via immune cells

Opioids are the most powerful painkillers. Researchers at the Charité - Universitätsmedizin Berlin have now found that the analgesic effects of opioids are not exclusively mediated by opioid receptors in the brain, but ...

Medical research

Researchers reveal neural mechanisms underlying opioid analgesia

A new study published in eLife by researchers from Dr. Sun Yangang's Lab at the Institute of Neuroscience, Center for Excellence in Brain Science and Intelligence Technology (CEBSIT) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has ...

Medications

FDA warns of rare skin reactions to acetaminophen

(HealthDay)—The widely used painkiller acetaminophen, best known as Tylenol, can cause rare but serious skin reactions and a warning about this danger will be added to product labels, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration ...

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Analgesic

An analgesic (also known as a painkiller) is any member of the group of drugs used to relieve pain (achieve analgesia). The word analgesic derives from Greek an- ("without") and algos ("pain").

Analgesic drugs act in various ways on the peripheral and central nervous systems; they include paracetamol (para-acetylaminophenol, also known in the US as acetaminophen), the non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs (NSAIDs) such as the salicylates, and opioid drugs such as morphine and opium. They are distinct from anesthetics, which reversibly eliminate sensation.

In choosing analgesics, the severity and response to other medication determines the choice of agent; the WHO pain ladder, originally developed in cancer-related pain, is widely applied to find suitable drugs in a stepwise manner. The analgesic choice is also determined by the type of pain: for neuropathic pain, traditional analgesics are less effective, and there is often benefit from classes of drugs that are not normally considered analgesics, such as tricyclic antidepressants and anticonvulsants.

This text uses material from Wikipedia, licensed under CC BY-SA