Abuse of Tramadol

 + 2  Article

·               Tramadol is still causing increasing anxiety although it is considered essential for treatment of cases of acute pain, especially after surgery & bone fractures which do not respond to normal analgesics.

·               Tramadol is a medicine which causes addiction. The patient needs to increase its dose constantly to obtain the desired effect, and if he stops its consumption, he is affected by a high degree of depression as if he was facing death. Here resides the danger. Many of those felt in the trap of addiction to Tramadol, unintentionally, for a better mood and a wanted joy, which helped in its spread among most social and age categories.

·               Some use Tramadol for sex, and others for bearing hard effort and long hours of work, and lastly as a wrong treatment for headache or analgesic for pain or stomach ache.

·               From the scientific point of view, Tramadol has its effect on cerebral morphine receptors and secretion of serotonin (hilarious hormone) by the brain. Therefore, it causes a condition of hilarity and as some say it cures some health problems that many may hide to doctors, as it helps to prolong the duration of ejaculation and thus improving performance during sexual intercourse. This is what Egyptians discovered before scientific researches did it!

·               Tramadol as a medicine is not essentially used to cure problems of fast ejaculation and its retardation is only of its side effects as it reduces nervous reaction.

·               Tramadol consumption increases among addicts due to spread of their special culture, as if they possess a scientific encyclopedia, while in fact these are experiences built on illusions. Mixtures of Tramadol are spread with many calming drugs to overcome its side effects, like tremors, tension, anxiety, muscle tremors and tachycardia. The most widespread mixture is its combination with Viagra to obtain a complementary effect in order to improve sexual performance, which is spread in popular areas, and sometimes, it is taken upon an advice of a non honest pharmacist.

·               Among some deviated categories is spread the so-called strawberry pill which is red. It is a type of Tramadol. Concerning addicts to heroin and opium, pills of Tramadol are an alternative as they have the same effect when the price of heroin is high.

·               Tramadol is only detected by a special analysis at detoxification center. Some exploit this to escape from examinations upon presentation to a job or for drivers.

·               The dream may be transformed into a nightmare by addiction to Tramadol to prolong duration of sexual intercourse and retardation of ejaculation, as it leads to a counteraction on short range. This means that the person may take it or two or three times and notice a fast and clear improvement. But when he stops consuming Tramadol, the condition worsens, which pushes him to increase the dose to overcome this problem.

·               On long range, Tramadol destroys reaction cerebral centers, which means eliminates totally sexual potency as it has an effect on the nervous system and not an organic effect. It is difficult to cure these contrary reactions, even after healing from addiction, and 50 % of these cases cannot practice their normal life with their partners.

·               Limitation of Tradamadol consumption in determined cases which are: cancer, fire belt and sometimes fractures. Mostly, these patients must be treated under medical supervision in hospitals.

·               Upon complaining of troubled sexual intercourse, there are medicines for treatment that do not cause addiction and they are safer than Tramadol, although they have a slower effect. There are also training methods of practice which achieve profit and better results, without recourse to medicines, according to the case and under supervision of the doctor.

·               Abuse consumption of Tramadol leads to fatal symptoms, starting from coma, convulsions causing shoulder dislocation and epilepsy registered among youth under 30, in addition to cardiac shock accompanied by high blood pressure and apnea leading to death.

·               According to statistics, death resulting of overdose varies between 5000 – 6000 and most of them is caused by late access of the patient to the proper treatment service.

·               Tramadol consumption reached the head of the list of narcotics consumed in Egypt with a percentage of 38 %, according to data of the Fund of fight & treatment of addiction, followed by consumption of different types of narcotics with a percentage of 35 %, hashish with 9 % and heroin with 8 %.

·               According to a report of the National Council for social & crime researches, 25 million pills of Tramadol have been introduced in Egypt in 2008. The ceased quantity represents only 15 % of what is smuggled for the youth.

·               Western frontiers with Libya represent the most important pathway for submerging the Egyptian market with drugs. Through it, 80 % of narcotics pass, either through Salloum terminal or through unknown roads in the desert, by professional smugglers. Traders buy them from Libya where they are not forbidden on the market. There are also traders who import narcotics from India and China to reach all Egyptian governorates, in addition to other terminals through which narcotics are smuggled like Cairo airport, Alexandria port and Port Said port.

Magdy Garas

April 2012