No--codeine only acts as a placebo cough suppressant.
No--codeine only acts as a placebo cough suppressant.
I know this is somewhat an indirect response to the original question, but I would be hardpressed to find an accepted guideline that includes codeine for pain relief. If this is chosen, you are setting your patients up for ongoing, unrelieved pain. Codeine (in any strength) is an excellent antitussive, but poor in pain relief with an analgesic ceiling of approximately 65mg. It has basically been found to be no more effective than paracetamol or an nsaid. However with that being said, I think in the US, we are quite aggressive in treating pain versus Europe. I do not think opioids are used as much as a standard of practice in Europe (based on what I've read). Clinically speaking, if I offered a patient codeine (or here codeine+acetaminophen), most of them would simply not take it.
Through my own use I'd have to disagree on this point. I'd say codeine is an excellent cough suppressant and does indeed stop mucous from being expelled from the lungs, along with all the consequences that go along with that.
I don't use it very often, but if I have a bad dry cough I'd say it works a treat. I don't see why it can't be used for diarrhoea as well.
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I work in hospital and as far as I'm concerned codeine works as an anti-tussive, painkiller, causes constipation and can be addictive. Maybe a one-off dose won't do anything, but definitely if taken on a regular basis it will cause all of the above. I wouldn't recommend codeine for a chesty cough as the cough mechanism is there to expel mucous from the lungs caused by the infection. The reason why the linctus you sell won't mention pain relief is because we're not legally allowed to sell codeine on its own for pain relief, the linctus is licensed for anti-tussive purposes only. The codeine in linctus is the same as that in tablets, and I see what you mean that in order to take pain killer doses of codeine (15-60mg) in the linctus form (5mg/5ml) you might end up taking too much of the other excipients, although I don't know what they are, and maybe it's OK. Codeine linctus 25mg/5ml is licensed for pain relief, but that is POM. You can buy soluble co-codamol tabs ofcourse.
Last edited by lrpolo; 2nd, May 2008 at 08:35 PM.
Piss off...immediately.
Had a recent Rx for codeine linctus, from talking to the pateint mother (pateint was a child), it was for pain,