China
Africa
Explore chapters and articles related to this topic
Designer Benzodiazepines
Published in Ornella Corazza, Andres Roman-Urrestarazu, Handbook of Novel Psychoactive Substances, 2018
Peter D. Maskell, Nathan E. Wilson
The pharmacodynamics/pharmacokinetics and the exact dose of individual NPS benzodiazepines are very difficult to predict as is the potency or effects of the individual benzodiazepines. The majority of the NPS benzodiazepines are illicitly manufactured, and dosing information on any covered material may be unreliable. Analysis of illicit tablets of diazepam and erimin 5 (nimetazepam) tablets found that the diazepam tablets, although labelled as 10 mg, contained anywhere between 0 and 48 mg of diazepam and that the erimin 5 tablets, rather than containing nimetazepam, contained phenazepam (Lim et al., 2017). There have also been numerous other cases around the world of illicit and fake diazepam tablets either not containing the claimed active ingredient or containing a different dose than claimed (Lobal et al., 2017). The clinical effects of NPS benzodiazepines are likely to be down to the individual potency; however, this is not easy to determine.
Wastewater analysis for psychoactive substances at music festivals across New South Wales, Australia in 2019–2020
Published in Clinical Toxicology, 2022
Jonathan Brett, Krista J. Siefried, Amy Healey, Mary Ellen Harrod, Erica Franklin, Monica J. Barratt, Jem Masters, Lynn Nguyen, Santosh Adiraju, Cobus Gerber
Due to the large volume of wastewater required for benzodiazepine analyses, samples for each festival were pooled, meaning only the detection frequency across all festivals could be measured. Of the 25 benzodiazepine-related compounds and their metabolites screened for, alprazolam, alpha-hydroxy-alprazolam, diazepam, etizolam, oxazepam and temazepam were found at all festivals sampled. Clonazepam and lorazepam were detected at 4 (80%) and 3 (60%) festivals respectively and 7-amino clonazepam, 7-amino nimetazepam, diclazepam at 2 (40%), 1 (20%) and 1 (20%) festival respectively (Table 2). Although not a benzodiazepine, quetiapine was also detected in all pooled samples from all festivals.
Occurrence and time course of NPS benzodiazepines in Sweden – results from intoxication cases in the STRIDA project
Published in Clinical Toxicology, 2019
Matilda Bäckberg, Madeleine Pettersson Bergstrand, Olof Beck, Anders Helander
The NPS BZD covered in this study (Figure 2) were adinazolam, bentazepam, clonazolam, cloniprazepam, diclazepam, deschloroetizolam, flubromazolam, flunitrazolam, 3-hydroxyflubromazepam, ketazolam, meclonazepam, metizolam, nifoxipam, nitrazolam, pivoxazepam, and pyrazolam (1 mg/mL solutions from Chiron, Trondheim, Norway), bromazepam, clobazam, etizolam, estazolam, flurazepam, 3-hydroxyphenazepam, N-desmethylflunitrazepam, nimetazepam, phenazepam, and prazepam (1 mg/mL solutions from Cerilliant, Round Rock, TX), flubromazepam (1 mg/mL solution from LGC, Teddington, UK), and tetrazepam (0.1 mg/mL solution from LGC). All solutes were obtained in acetonitrile or methanol.
The Use of Benzodiazepines among Kratom (Mitragyna Speciosa Korth.) Users
Published in Journal of Psychoactive Drugs, 2020
Darshan Singh, Suresh Narayanan, Oliver Grundmann, Edward W. Boyer, Balasingam Vicknasingam
A total of 77 kratom cocktail users with current BZO use were recruited from the northern state of Penang, Malaysia, through snowball sampling for this cross-sectional study. The study data were collected between January and April 2017. Since kratom use is regulated in Malaysia and the misuse of kratom cocktail has received negative media coverage, it was difficult to openly recruit participants. We, therefore, relied on several known people who used kratom to introduce us to their acquaintances who reported using a kratom cocktail with BZO. Subsequently, these informants (or “seeds”) continued to refer additional potential individuals to us. Through this process we obtained a total of 77 participants. A urine drug screen was also conducted using rapid urine-test-kits (acquired from Reszon Diagnostic International, Malaysia) to confirm their illicit drug use. All the surveys were conducted through face-to-face interviews by a research assistant recruited from the community and given training how the semi-structured questionnaire was used to collect the socio-demographic characteristics (e.g. gender, ethnicity, current age, marital, education and employment status), kratom use history (e.g. duration of kratom use, frequency and quantity of daily kratom use), previous and current illicit drug use history, reasons for BZO use, and side-effects associated with BZO discontinuation. All participants reported using Nimetazepam, which is also known by its street name “Erimin 5”. Erimin 5 is commonly distributed illegally on the streets and is often used by illicit drug users in Malaysia (Abdullah et al. 2012). Though the prevalence of BZO use is reported to be low by the National Anti-Drug Agency (NADA), the Royal Malaysian Police (RMP) recently seized and crippled several BZO production and trafficking syndicates in the country (New Straits Times 2017; 2018).