Overdoses of methadone ? used as a replacement drug for opiate addicts but also an increasingly popular painkiller ? can lead to heart and breathing problems and death, the Food and Drug Administration warned this week.
Methadone can cause slow or shallow breathing and potentially deadly changes in users? heart rates. Dangerous side effects and deaths have been reported among people who use the drug as a painkiller, including Daniel Smith, the late son of Anna Nicole Smith.
Part of the problem, the FDA said, is that methadone is only effective as a painkiller for four to eight hours, though the drug remains in the body more than two days. Patients taking subsequent doses to relieve pain can unwittingly build up a toxic dose.
The FDA urged doctors to be cautious about prescribing the drug and to monitor patients closely, giving strong warnings against takingmore than prescribed.
Doctors wrote more than 2 million prescriptions for methadone as a painkiller in 2003, and use is still rising. An estimated 2,452 overdose deaths were attributed to methadone in 2003, up from 623 in 1999.
