Tramadol - Your Ultimate Guide

Headache and joint pains are the common things experienced everyday. People tend to take over-the-counter drugs like paracetamol and analgesic, which are the most common pain relievers. Truth is, many don't seek medical attention right away. This could make the ailment more serious in the long run.

People always associate pain to something like a pinch of a needle in one's fingers not knowing that it can lead to a serious disease in the future. Some types of pain are somewhat related to everyday activities like sudden stomach cramps whenever something had to be rushed in the office. It's actually related to stress, which causes hormonal imbalance that leads to stomach cramps.

A good relaxation technique like listening to good music, for example, can help ease minor pain like headache. You can also start:

• to have a balance diet
• avoid fatty foods
• eat more fruits, which will make you feel light and more relaxed.

It's not bad to take medicines to make you comfortable after the pain but it's always best to seek for medical help especially when taking a prescription drug. Tramadol is a pain reliever commonly used to treat moderate to severe pain. Its main task is to change the way a person feels towards pain inside his body. It is a prescription drug that can't be bought over the counter when you don't have a doctor's prescription. It should not be taken by those people who had seizures because attacks are more likely to happen while taking it in the long run. It's not also recommended to those who had been addicted to any kind of drug.

Those taking anti depressants and under medications for another kind of illness should also avoid taking Tramadol because according to health experts, this drug can be habit forming when taken for a long period of time. It's safe to use even on empty stomach. But before taking Tramadol you should first seek medical help. A doctor should guide you on how to use it, how often you should take it, how many doses in a day, and how long you should take it.

It will be effective with the proper guidance from your doctor, as this drug could have harmful effects if taken unsupervised. An overdose of Tramadol can be fatal. Some of the fatal effects of Tramadol overdose are:

• difficulty in breathing
• drowsiness
• palpitation
• weakness
• coma

You cannot just suddenly stop taking this drug like some anti allergy drugs. This one should be stopped accordingly in moderation - from big doses down to smaller ones. Small doses will be given to patient everyday until he is asked to stop. That is why a doctor's guidance is needed when taking this drug.

Everything ingested can affect everything that is inside the body, so you should be careful in taking medicines especially if your doctor does not recommend them. Visible side effects include:

• dizziness
• headaches
• heartburn
• mood changes
• seizures,
• hives

When you suddenly experience these side effects consult your doctor and stop taking the drug to control any effects that can lead to a more serious disease.

Assessment of Tramadol in the Management of Pain

Tramadol is a cyclohexanol derivative with mu-agonist activity. It has been used as an analgesic for postoperative or chronic pain since the late 1970s, and became one of the most popular analgesics of its class in Germany. International interest has been renewed during the past few years, when it was discovered that tramadol not only acts on opioid receptors, but also inhibits serotonin (5-hydroxytryptamine; 5-HT) and noradrenaline (norepinephrine) reuptake. This review aims to provide a risk-benefit assessment of tramadol in the management of acute and chronic pain syndromes.

Tramadol has been used intraoperatively as part of balanced anaesthesia. Such use is under discussion, however, as it was associated with a high incidence of intraoperative recall and dreaming, and postoperative respiratory depression has been described after intraoperative administration of high doses. Postoperatively, intravenous and intramuscular tramadol has been used with good efficacy. Analgesic doses were comparable with pethidine (meperidine) and 10 times higher than morphine. Nausea and vomiting were the most frequently reported adverse effects.

In controlled studies, haemodynamic and respiratory parameters were only minimally impaired. The risk of severe respiratory depression in typical dosages is negligible in comparison with other opioids used for postoperative pain management. Tramadol has been used with good results for the management of labour pain without respiratory depression of the neonate. It was also effective for the treatment of pain from myocardial ischaemia, ureteric colic and acute trauma. Good results have been published for cancer pain management with tramadol in several studies.

The potential for abuse or addiction seems to be minimal, and serious complications have not been reported. For patients with severe pain, the efficacy of morphine is superior, and most patients with adequate analgesia from tramadol had to be changed to a more potent opioid after a few weeks due to increased nociceptive input during tumour progression.

Tramadol can be recommended as a safe and efficient drug for step II according to the World Health Organization guidelines for cancer pain management.