SWMBO has had some pains recently, and it occurred to me that over the past few years, the first suggestion from medics has been paracetamol.
When and why did asprin (which if nothing else has a long proven record of relatively safe usage) fall out of favour ?
I know paracetamol is an anti-pyretic (sp) but not all pains are fever related.
Aspirin is antipyretic. It also thins the blood, so can lead to internal bleeding. It is said that aspirin would not pass modern drug safety standards, if it had been discovered recently. :)
and, should aspirin be banned, find a willow tree and you can always use the bark :-)
GI bleeding.
It is widely prescribed for conditions where blood clots would be a problem: for people with a history of heart disease (cardiac arteries narrowed/blocked by plaques) or strokes. Because it causes internal bleeding with long-term usage, it is normal to also take drugs which minimise that.
aspirin wreks your stomach if used regularly. Ibuprofen is better in that respect, but otherwise similar.
I think it was very rare but nasty (even fatal) side effects, ISTR "Reye syndrome".
Thomas Prufer
Strictly it does not thin the blood, it acts as an anticoagulant. Clots won't form.
Warfarin is IITRC the 'blood thinner'
From a US site, however is thius
"There are two main types of blood thinners. Anticoagulants such as heparin or warfarin (also called Coumadin) slow down your body's process of making clots. Antiplatelet drugs, such as aspirin, prevent blood cells called platelets from clumping together to form a clot."
I've always been told that 'thinners' is normally reserved for the first type.
... but with 25% lethality (though wiki tells me this and I Am Not A Doctor).
So: "take something else that's about as good without this Russian Roulette" is reasonable advice.
Thomas Prufer
I should have been more precise.
By the way: "Aspirin was even partly responsible for the rise of Rasputin. Tsar Nicholas II's son Alexis was taking it, and Rasputin, appalled at a Western branded medicine being used at the court of St Petersburg, ordered this stopped. He wanted more mystical remedies applied. The effect was instant. The boy was a haemophiliac, and aspirin's then-unknown blood-thinning properties were doing him no good at all. Rasputin's reputation soared as the tsarevich's bleeding quietened down."
(From the Independent.)
I never found either that good at pain relief, Ibuprofen works much better.
I think Aspirin is all being used up to thin peoples blood so instead of high blood pressure they die of bleeding to death. Brian
Bit like the bicycle and health and safety rules then. Brian
I was prescribed aspirin as a "just in case" I suffered circulation problem s as a result of another condition. In the the end I haven't had any circul ation issues so stopped using it as it was driving me bleedin' ( pun intend ed) crackers every time i nicked myself shaving. Even the slightest nick br ought on an unstemmable flow of blood.
Richard
I always use aspirin. Paracetamol makes me sick. I am intolerant to it.
However, few people realise that although aspirin can cause ulcers and blee ding in the stomach it is actually far safer that paracetamol which is easy to overdose on ( taking as few as 9 tablets across a day will do it) and t here is little that can be done about an overdose . It destroys the liver.
It takes a lot of aspirin to kill you.
If I am not using aspirin I take ibuprofen. It works similarly to aspirin f or me but never paracetamol. I have always been intolerant to it and it doe sn't even do the job of killing pain in me.
Big pharma want you to use paracetamol because they can make more money ou t of it.
Yep.
takes a while
Clive Arthur explained on 10/10/2017 :
They soaked clothes in urine in WW1, to avoid the effects of gas :oÞ .
Correlation is not causation. I can well imagine, however, that the clothes of victims of chlorine gas might well be drenched in urine.
Nick
Actualy no, generic paracetamol is REALLY cheap which is why they wrap it up with e.g. caffeine and a decongestant in things like lem-sip
Oddly enough paracetamol works best for me.
The difference between a therapeutic dose of paracetamol and a harmful dose is quite small. Surprisingly so.
A dose of 150mg/kg bodyweight is 'unlikely' to cause severe liver damage, whilst 250 mg/kg is 'likely' to.
12g (24 tablets) is 'potentially fatal'.But it can do it more insidiously, just from a normal dose.
Big pharma does not make cheap generic medicines like this.
I'm not intolerant to paracetemol but I use aspirin as my first choice and ibuprofen as my second choice for the same reasons as you.
This being a DIY group, may I mention that paracetamol does have its uses? It's an essential ingredient in a developer for black and white films called Rodinal. Google "DIY Rodinal" to find out how easy it is to make up the recipe yourself.
Nick
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