Posted by Questionmark on June 9, 2003, at 0:21:40
In reply to Re: SSRI's and Ephedrine » tumnus, posted by noa on June 7, 2003, at 14:51:52
You all mentioned some important things/ made good points. But i wanted to comment on a couple things.
> Also, I hope you have been following the news stories about athletes and ephedra, and I think it has been banned in baseball after the death of that young player.
Yes, but how much ephedra/ephedrine was this person taking? i could be wrong but i imagine it was more than a reasonable amount, especially combined with the potential of overheating or dehydration. i really believe that most of the fatal or harmful reactions with ephedra/ephedrine occurred from taking an excessively high dose or from combining w/ sh** it should not be combined with. i've taken ephedra numerous times at no more than moderate doses and have never been more stimulated than i can be on a few cups of coffee at most (& nowhere near the stimulation i get from Adderall or methylphenidate). Again just start w/ low dose and exercise caution.
> The stimulating effects from ephedrine are blocked by dopamine antagonists that effect D1 and D2, so the dopamine system is involved, but its primary effect is on the alpha-adrenergic receptors...
Okay, i'm mostly ignorant here, so i may be wrong, but this is the kind of stuff that makes me really question the validity of psychiatric & pharmacological research. Any dopamine D1 & D2 antagonist is going to greatly nullify any kind of stimulating effects-- whether from a DA agonist or otherwise-- it seems like at least. i mean, if you inhaled/injected some epinephrine after taking a DA antagonist, wouldn't the stimulating effects still be significantly diminished? That said, if the same kind of analysis was used to determine that ephedrine is an adrenergic agonist, then maybe it's really just a DA agonist and not an adrenergic one. So... i'm confused.
How trustworthy is information on the pharmacological activity/profile of various substances? Anyone have an idea? Am i missing something that makes these tests more valid?
poster:Questionmark
thread:232094
URL: http://www.dr-bob.org/babble/20030604/msgs/232524.html