Thursday, May 25, 2006
Street drug names
In preparing for a talk on methadone, I came across the White House Drug Policy web site, which has a very interesting list of slang terms for street drugs and more importantly for health care professionals the slang terms for medications that have made their way to the street.
Unfortunately many of the medicines that are in the arsenal of a hospice and palliative medicine practioner can be abused. Patients who truly can benefit from these medications and not become addicted unfortunately are the ones who suffer because of the black market for these medications.
I thought some of the names were interesting and this list may be helpful to others when preparing talks on medications used in our field.
Slang terms (main page - here) for morphine, methadone, oxycodone, fentanyl, methylphenidate, lidocaine, scopolamine (who knew?), and steroids.
Obviously I am not advocating for illegal use of any of these medicines. Just pointing out that we need to be careful and fully knowledgeable about the medications we prescribe.