'New/Designer Benzodiazepines': an analysis of the literature and psychonauts’ trip reports
Author
Orsolini, Laura
Corkery, John
Chiappini, Stephania
Guirguis, Amira
Vento, Alessandro
De Berardis, Domenico
Papanti, Duccio
Schifano, Fabrizio
Attention
2299/22567
Abstract
Background: NPS belonging to the benzodiazepine (BZD) class, e.g., ‘legal/designer BZDs’/‘research chemicals’, have recently emerged in the drug (mainly online/virtual) market. Objective: While certain NPS belonging to the BZD class possess pharmacological profiles similar to controlled pharmaceutical BZDs, clinical and pharmacological profiles of current emerging BZDs are still not well-described. Therefore, there is a need to increase clinicians’/public health knowledge/awareness, to incentive harm reduction strategies. Method: A comprehensive overview was carried out by using the EMCDDA/EDND database regu-larly monitored by our research team, by specifically looking at the ‘new BZDs’ so far notified. Furthermore, given the limitation of peer-reviewed data published so far, a nonparticipant multilin-gual qualitative netnographic study was conducted to obtain further clinical/pharmacological/ toxicological data, including psychonauts’ online trip reports. Results: First designer BZDs appeared as NPS around 2007. So far, 29 designer BZDs have been notified to the EMCDDA, being some of them extremely powerful, also at lower dosages. They are sold as tablets/powder/pellets/capsules/blotters/liquids, at very affordable prices, and variably ad-ministered. Some are also sold on the illicit drugmarket as counterfeit forms of traditional BZDs or as either adulterants or diluents in heroin or other synthetic opioids/cannabinoids. Nowadays, there is no guarantee of the quality of designer BZDs composition/purification and, hence, most NPS consumers may be inadvertently exposed to unsafe and harmful compounds. Conclusion: Given the limited information on their pharmacology/toxicity, variations in dosage, onset of effects, combination of substances, potency, and general patient or individual variability, the concomitant use of these substances with other drugs entails several and unpredictable risks.
Publication date
2020-01-10Published in
Current NeuropharmacologyPublished version
https://doi.org/10.2174/1570159X18666200110121333Other links
http://hdl.handle.net/2299/22567Metadata
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