Nicotine: A New Treatment for Pain Relief

             For many centuries, morphine was used as an opioid to eliminate and to numb the pain. Recently, scientists have studied the effects of neuronal nicotinic receptors (nAChRs) also known as Nicotinic acetylcholine receptors, with regards to its analgesic effects. Dr. Daniel S. McGehee gave a lecture at Loyola University of Chicago about pain relief being a beneficial property of smoking. Madeline Vann discusses a study at Duke University, which gave ninety non-smoking men nicotine patch as pain reliever or an identical nicotine-free patch to test the effects of nicotine in terms of pain relief. The men who received the nicotine patch self-administer less morphine during the 24-hour period following surgery than the men who had nicotine-free patches. From this study, it was concluded that nicotine relieved pain without the narcotic side effects, which are associated with morphine. 

According to McGehee’s “nAChRs mediate antinociception via various receptor subtypes distributed among multiple central and peripheral nociceptive areas...Successful analgesic drug development will require better understanding of these neural circuits, how they are modified by chronic pain, and how nAChRs can be exploited to suppress pain signaling”. From McGehee’s research we learned that there is still some uncertainty about how these neural circuits of analgesic drugs work and how they are modified by chronic pain. They are still unsure about how nAChRs can be altered to suppress pain. All they know is nicotine can suppress pain.  

Now one may wonder isn’t nicotine addictive. Will taking these patches affect my health negatively? Will I become an addict? Dr. Ashraf Habib, associate professor of anesthesiology and director of quality improvement at Duke University Medical Center stated,” short-term analgesic use of nicotine is not addictive. He said future studies would address different doses of nicotine and the drug's effect in different groups of people, such as smokers and women”. As we can now infer that the effect of nicotine depends on the height, weight and gender of the patient. As studies further improve their hypothesis and goals, they can determine nicotine patches that are short-term analgesic so one does not get addicted to nicotine. Studies have yet to learn more about the benefits and disadvantages of nicotine patches and how they interact with nAchRs receptors.

In conclusion, nicotine can suppress pain by interacting with nAchRs receptors to numb or eliminate the pain via the pain suppressing mechanism. The details and exact pathway of how nicotine interacts with such receptors is still yet to be further examined, but according to other researchers a hot topic in the medical field. If researchers continue to further examine this pathway, nicotine patches may be the best answer after surgery to relive a patient’s pain and help ease their recovery quickly.

References:

Umana, Iboro C., Daniele, Claire A., and McGehee, Daniel S. "Neuronal nicotinic receptors as analgesic targets: It’s a winding road." Biochemical Pharmacology, nos. 1208-1214, 2013. Biochemical Pharmacology- Elsevier.

Vann, Madeline. "Nicotine, Chili Peppers Offer Post-Surgery Pain Relief." ABC, 23 Mar. 2017. ABC News.

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