Ephedrine enhances the antinociceptive effect of dexmedetomidine in mice.

Objectives: Dexmedetomidine, a highly selective alpha-2-adrenoceptor agonist, was recently introduced into clinical practice for its sedative and analgesic properties. The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether the psychostimulant drug ephedrine has any effect on dexmedetomidine-induced antinociception and locomotor inhibitor activity in mice in acute application.

Methods: In both sexes of swiss albino mice; antinociception was assessed with hot-plate test and the locomotor, exploratory activities were assessed with holed open field test.

Irreversible and reversible components in the genesis of hypertension by sodium chloride (salt).

Despite the abundant studies and overwhelming evidences demonstrating the essential role of salt (sodium chloride) for developing "essential" hypertension (EH), the controversies about salt-hypertension (HT) relations are still continuing. One of important mistakes in this topic is assuming that the HT-producing effect of salt is reversible. The present paper explains the complex nature of salt-HT relations.

The medieval physician Avicenna used an herbal calcium channel blocker, Taxus baccata L.

Calcium channel blockers are drugs which are important for current medical therapy. The first examples of synthetic congeners of this class of drugs appear around at the beginning of the 1960s. Review of the current and historical literature shows that Avicenna (Ibn Sina) (980-1037) had used the herbal drug 'Zarnab' (Taxus baccata L.

Salt addiction: a different kind of drug addiction.

Under the headline "drug addiction" the medical world has exclusively been interested in psychoactive drugs. For diagnosis of substance dependence (addiction), DSM-IV-TR has determined seven criteria, and fulfilling at least three of them signifies addiction. When studied salt intake according to these criteria it is seen that most of them are fulfilled, showing that sodium chloride, which is not classified under the psychoactive drugs, is capable of producing addiction.

Is systemic hypertension only a sign of chronic sodium chloride intoxication?

The most important obstacle for preventing hypertension is the belief that systemic hypertension has no identifiable cause. This belief, hiding the main offender, sodium chloride, causes too much time wasting for combating against hypertension. Accepting that sodium chloride is a drug and re-evaluating the situation at the light of current pharmacologic rules, it can be possible to get rid of the suspicions about the etiologic role of sodium chloride for developing systemic hypertension.