We have published 11 scientific articles

1.

Citalopram in fatal poisoning cases.

Jonasson B, Saldeen T.

Forensic Sci Int. 2002 Mar 28;126(1):1-6.

2.

The prevalence of analgesics containing dextropropoxyphene or codeine in individuals suspected of driving under the influence of drugs.

Jonasson U, Jonasson B, Saldeen T, Thuen F.

Forensic Sci Int. 2000 Aug 14;112(2-3):163-9.

3.

Middle-aged men--a risk category regarding fatal poisoning due to dextropropoxyphene and alcohol in combination.

Jonasson U, Jonasson B, Saldeen T.

Prev Med. 2000 Aug;31(2 Pt 1):103-6.

4.

Among fatal poisonings dextropropoxyphene predominates in younger people, antidepressants in the middle aged and sedatives in the elderly.

Jonasson B, Jonasson U, Saldeen T.

J Forensic Sci. 2000 Jan;45(1):7-10.

5.

Correlation between prescription of various dextropropoxyphene preparations and their involvement in fatal poisonings.

Jonasson U, Jonasson B, Saldeen T.

Forensic Sci Int. 1999 Jul 26;103(2):125-32.

6.

Fatal poisonings where ethylmorphine from antitussive medications contributed to death.

Jonasson B, Jonasson U, Holmgren P, Saldeen T.

Int J Legal Med. 1999;112(5):299-302.

7.

Suicides may be overreported and accidents underreported among fatalities due to dextropropoxyphene.

Jonasson B, Jonasson U, Saldeen T.

J Forensic Sci. 1999 Mar;44(2):334-8.

8.

The manner of death among fatalities where dextropropoxyphene caused or contributed to death.

Jonasson B, Jonasson U, Saldeen T.

Forensic Sci Int. 1998 Sep 28;96(2-3):181-7.

9.

The prevalence of dextropropoxyphene in autopsy blood samples.

Jonasson U, Jonasson B, Holmgren P, Saldeen T.

Forensic Sci Int. 1998 Sep 28;96(2-3):135-42.

10.

Analgesic use disorders among orthopedic and chronic pain patients at a rehabilitation clinic.

Jonasson U, Jonasson B, Wickström L, Andersson E, Saldeen T.

Subst Use Misuse. 1998 May;33(6):1375-85.

11.

The feasibility of a new intake routine to assess substance use disorders by means of a structured interview.

Jonasson B, Jonasson U, Ekselius L, von Knorring L.

Gen Hosp Psychiatry. 1997 Jan;19(1):36-41.

In re: Darvocet, Darvon and Propoxyphene products liability litigation MDH np. 2226. http://bit.ly/nIcBKo

As you know Propoxyphene was banned in US November 19^th last year and immediately lawsuits began to be filed against Xanodyne Pharmaceutical and Eli Lilly on behalf of people who had taken Darvon, Darvocet or generic Propoxyphene, or behalf of people that have lost some dear ones due to Propoxyphene. 

The initial Darvon lawsuit was filed in US district court in New Orleans was alleging that the medication caused the plaintiff to suffer a heart attack.

The suit seeks class action status on behalf of other similarity suited former users of Darvon and Darvocet.

Subsequently, a motion was filed on December 15, 2010 requesting all Darvon and Darvocet lawsuits filed in various federal districts courts throughout The United States to be centralizes before on federal court.

The United States Judicial Panel on Multi-District Litigation (MDL) met on August 16, 2011, the Panel decided that all federal Darvocet and Darvon cases would be consolidated in the Eastern District of Kentucky (Covington Division) and assigned to the Honorable Danny C. Reeves for pretrial proceedings. The granting of multi-district litigation (MDL) treatment will streamline the lawsuits, allowing the parties to avoid duplicative discovery and inconsistent rulings from different judges. Additionally, MDL treatment will provide more convenience for the witnesses, the parties and the court.

Go to; http://bit.ly/nIcBKo

There are 1 789 scinetific articles about Propoxyphene

If you go to Pub Med http://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed and search for propoxyphene you get 1789 hits. If you search for dextropropoxyphene you get 1529. It is not so much if you consider that the substance has been around since 1953. 

From these 1789 hits we are the writers of 10 articles where we study propoxyphene/dextropropoxyphene from different point of views.

As far as I know no other researchers had written so many articles about DXP as we had done. I will just mention that. If you look for acetaminophen you get 15 062 and paracetamol  17 184 and for codeine you get 6 209, (the numbers are form September 2^nd 2011). Morphine gets 52 672 and methadone 11 738. Methadone is quite close to Dextropropoxyphene.

Some English researchers wrote this article; Co-proxamol and suicide: preventing the continuing toll of overdose deaths. http://qjmed.oxfordjournals.org/content/98/3/159.2.full

The researchers were; S. Simkin, K. Hawton, L. Sutton, D. Gunnel, O. Bennewith and N. KPU. They worked at the University of Oxford Centre for Suicide Research, Department of Psychiatry, Warneford Hospital, Oxford, Department of Social Medicine, University of Bristol, Bristol and Centre for Suicide Prevention, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK.

When they wrote their article they mention in Method: Literature search; Electronic searches of PsycINFO (1872–2003),MEDLINE (1966–2003), EMBASE (1980–2003) andCINAHL (1982–2003) were done, using search terms for co-proxamol, coproxamol, dextropropoxyphene and distalgesic combined with terms for overdose, self poisoning, suicide and attempted suicide. Four hundred and two papers were identified. From these we selected 42 English language papers where the contents of the abstract were relevant to the aims of this review. Twenty additional relevant papers were identified from reference lists.

This article is really very good research, and I repeat; they chose six of our articles, and the references were 73. We could feel very proud that they chose so many of our articles.

It was after this article was published the MHRA - (Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory Agency), banned dextropropoxyphene.

In the US no such reserach has ever been done.

Medicines and Healthcare products Regulatory

CV - Ulf and Birgitta Jonasson, 2011

http://bit.ly/n3mF9G

Our scientific background

We are Drs Ulf and Birgitta Jonasson from Sweden and we have studied the painkilling substance (Dextro)Propoxyphene (DXP) since 1993, that is now more than 18 years.

We wrote and published 8 scientific articles about the substance from different point of views.

http://1.usa.gov/mZMowV

We wrote and defended two doctoral dissertations: 

Jonasson B. Studies on dextropropoxyphene - with special reference to dependence among chronic pain patients, classification of the manner of death in fatal poisoning, and characteristics of the fatal poisoning victims. Dissertation from the Faculty of Medicine. Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Uppsala 2000. ISBN 91-554-4729-5. (around 90 pages)

Jonasson U. Studier av bruket av dextropropoxifen ur ett folkhälsoperspektiv. Påverkan av ett regelverk. (Studies on the use of dextropropoxyphene from the aspect of public health. Influence on at regulatory framework). Dissertations for the degree of Doctor of Public Health. The Nordic School of Public health. Gothenburg. Sweden, 2001. ISBN 91-694798-43-2 (around 130 p)

We also presented our research in a popular science version – to get the results known outside the academic world

Dödsfall genom bruk och missbruk av värktabletter. (1999) – Swedish version. (64 p)

Fatalities due to use or misuse of painkillers. (2001) – English version. (71 p)

Restrictions on the prescribing of dextropropoxyphene (DXP) effects on sales and cases of fatal poisoning (Report written on the behalf of National Board of Forensic Medicine, Medical Product Agency, in cooperation with National Social Insurance Board and Swedish Poisons Information Centre) 2004. (19 p)

Darvon and Darvocet are the worst drugs ever

The painkilling substance (Dextro) Propoxyphene (DXP) was synthesized in US 1953 by the pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly and it came out on the market 1957. The most sold brand names in US were Darvon and Darvocet.

These drugs were said to be safe – by the manufacturers - but soon after it came out on the American market there were some reports of very serious side effects by using the drugs. In 1964 the first person was reported poisoned to death by using the substance.

We – drs Ulf and Birgitta Jonasson from Uppsala in Sweden – have studied this substance since 1993. It is now more than 18 years. We wrote and published eight scientific articles about the drug, we wrote and defended two doctoral dissertations – 2000 and 2001 – and we also wrote a popular version of our research data. This report was published both in Swedish (1999) and in English (2001) “ Fatalities due to use or misuse of pain-killers”.

Our main result was that 200 persons were poisoned to death every year during t the investigated years 1992-1999 due to the use of DXP. 

Last year – November 19^{th -}2010 - FDA in US (US Food and Drug Administration) banned the drug. The drug was earlier banned in UK 2005 and in the European Union 2009. Restrictions about prescribing the drug were also implemented in Sweden 2005.

In Aug 16^th 2011 – the JPML (United States Judicial Panel on Multidistrict Litigation) decided that trials about damages caused by using DXP should be held on the federal level, in the Eastern District of Kentucky (Covington Division) and the Judge will be Danny C Reeves.

This blog will tell you lots of background data  from our 18 years of researching on (Dextro) Propoxypohene (DXP)and we welcome you to join the debate.