[Effects of tiapride infusion on plasma levels of beta-endorphin, prolactin and dopamine in patients with pain from cancer (author's transl)].

  • 18 April 1981
    • journal article
    • clinical trial
    • Vol. 57  (15)
Abstract
Tiapride, a substituted benzamide, exerts an antalgic effect in man. To examine the possibility that tiapride analgesia might be related to a mechanism involving a release of endogenous opioids, the acute effects of an intravenous injection of the drug on plasma radioimmunoassayable beta-endorphin were studied in patients with pain from cancer (placebo-tiapride double-blind randomized trial). Seeing that substituted benzamides affect prolactin secretion, the plasmatic levels of prolactin and dopamine, a known factor inhibiting prolactin release, were studied as well. The tiapride infusion produced a slight but significant increase in plasma beta-endorphin level, an early and significant increase in plasma prolactin, and a sudden and highly significant decrease in plasma dopamine. These results are compatible with the hypothesis that tiapride influences the neuroendocrine system.

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