Comparative analgesic potency of pharmaceutical diamorphine compared to forms of street heroin?

[TheJuner]

Alright so I'm pretty knowledgeable about the differences between the commonly available forms of heroin, both illicit and pharmaceutical, and generally know a fair amount about the pharmacology of heroin and opioids as a whole. Recently I've been thinking about whether or not we have information surrounding the comparative potency of different forms of heroin, for example how much heroin base/#3 heroin would you need to dose to induce analgesia comparable to 50mg diamorphine HCL, and how much black tar heroin would you need to dose to reach the same effect and so on. When I am referring to these different forms of heroin, I am assuming that these are all pure and free of any adulterants that could either lessen or increase the potency. When I say purity, I am also aware that for some of these forms of heroin 100% purity is an impossibility, like with BTH for example, which is inherently an impure product due to crude synthesis and as such can only be around 25%-30% diamorphine even without being cut. The crude synthesis of BTH also yields a product which is not simply just 25%-30% diamorphine with the rest just being inactive black asphalt like matter, the rest of the product is essentially other byproducts of the synthesis which are active. Both the active metabolites of diamorphine such as 6-monoacetylmorphine(1), 3-monoacetylmorphine, and morphine end up in BTH, as well as the naturally occurring alkaloids of the opium poppy like codeine, morphine, thebaine, etc. The fact that BTH is so impure makes coming up with an equianalgesic conversion between BTH and pure diamorphine/other opioids in general very difficult. Pharmaceutical heroin/diamorphine comes in the form of hydrochloride salt and is 1.5-2x the potency of morphine by weight and is very water soluble. For heroin base (brown heroin/#3) I am unsure of where the purity peaks around, and generally I know the least about this form of heroin. What I do know is that it isn't very soluble in water which makes it have poor intranasal bioavailability and also makes IV/IM/SC use more difficult, with injection necessitating the use of ascorbic acid. The poor water solubility of heroin base makes smoking a common ROA for this substance (though smoking is a common ROA for BTH as well). Is there any way to come up with an equipotency/equianalgesic table for the different types of heroin?

1: 6-monoacetylmorphine, while being a major active metabolite of diamorphine is more potent than diamorphine if one were to produce an equally large amount of 6-MAM. 3-MAM, another one of the main active metabolites of diamorphine is not nearly as potent as 6-MAM.

 

[TheJuner]

Also an important note but PURITY DOES NOT EQUAL POTENCY!!!! With impure forms of heroin like BTH, converting to diamorphine isn't a simple task of taking the highest possible purity that BTH can have and then saying "a 100mg dose of BTH with 25% purity will have the same effect as 25mg pharmaceutical grade diamorphine." Again, this is because BTH even as an uncut product isn't merely 25-30% diamorphine with the rest being inactive, given the crude synthesis used to manufacture BTH the diamorphine is accompanied by other active contents like the active metabolites of diamorphine and the alkaloids of the opium poppy. While impurities, like cuts, can reduce the overall potency of a bag of heroin (for example, a 0.1g bag of #4 heroin that only contains 10% heroin with the rest being baking soda), they can also drastically increase potency (for example: a 0.1g bag of #4 heroin only has 10% heroin but this time the rest of the bag is a mix of fentanyl and xylazine).

 

[Keif' Richards]

Hey @TheJuner this is a question that almost all of us have asked ourselves over the years. You will find lots of opinions and hearsay with limited factual evidence. You might find that the DEA has stated x, y or z. For instance, this "the average purity of Heroin in this region right now is ~40%" The problem is that the DEA is probably testing a very limited diversity of samples. Different dealers are going to provide products of radically different potencies. To truly get an "average" that is worth anything, they would need to test a large number of samples from different places over time. My understanding is that the DEA typically conducts tests specifically on seized substances. At any rate, their statistics are not useful or of practical value to us users.

The other questions that you're asking are really quite complex. You are going back and forth between the concepts of objective and subjective experience. You say something like "potency does not equate to the effects" I know what you're getting at.

The fact is, we only have what we have in trying to navigate the potency and purity of our drugs. The only way that you can know is to have your drugs tested, period. Furthermore, different people will inevitably be affected differently by the same drug.

My point is, at the end of the day, you are looking at a moving target in the best of situations. For the average user of Opioids on the street, it is essentially pointless to seriously consider information like these statistics. For the statistics to be of any value at all, that user would need to have his drugs tested and then compare with the statistics. Even if this were to happen, which it never would, that same person is likely to get different drugs the next time they pick up, making it all totally irrelevant.

In these scenarios, absent of any kind of legitimate testing, the user's own subjective experience with the drug will give them the most relevant information possible. Most junkies can discern between Fentanyl and Heroin/Morphine and even other Opioids.

 

[SolumSadie]

Alright so I'm pretty knowledgeable about the differences between the commonly available forms of heroin, both illicit and pharmaceutical, and generally know a fair amount about the pharmacology of heroin and opioids as a whole. Recently I've been thinking about whether or not we have information surrounding the comparative potency of different forms of heroin, for example how much heroin base/#3 heroin would you need to dose to induce analgesia comparable to 50mg diamorphine HCL, and how much black tar heroin would you need to dose to reach the same effect and so on. When I am referring to these different forms of heroin, I am assuming that these are all pure and free of any adulterants that could either lessen or increase the potency. When I say purity, I am also aware that for some of these forms of heroin 100% purity is an impossibility, like with BTH for example, which is inherently an impure product due to crude synthesis and as such can only be around 25%-30% diamorphine even without being cut. The crude synthesis of BTH also yields a product which is not simply just 25%-30% diamorphine with the rest just being inactive black asphalt like matter, the rest of the product is essentially other byproducts of the synthesis which are active. Both the active metabolites of diamorphine such as 6-monoacetylmorphine(1), 3-monoacetylmorphine, and morphine end up in BTH, as well as the naturally occurring alkaloids of the opium poppy like codeine, morphine, thebaine, etc. The fact that BTH is so impure makes coming up with an equianalgesic conversion between BTH and pure diamorphine/other opioids in general very difficult. Pharmaceutical heroin/diamorphine comes in the form of hydrochloride salt and is 1.5-2x the potency of morphine by weight and is very water soluble. For heroin base (brown heroin/#3) I am unsure of where the purity peaks around, and generally I know the least about this form of heroin. What I do know is that it isn't very soluble in water which makes it have poor intranasal bioavailability and also makes IV/IM/SC use more difficult, with injection necessitating the use of ascorbic acid. The poor water solubility of heroin base makes smoking a common ROA for this substance (though smoking is a common ROA for BTH as well). Is there any way to come up with an equipotency/equianalgesic table for the different types of heroin?

1: 6-monoacetylmorphine, while being a major active metabolite of diamorphine is more potent than diamorphine if one were to produce an equally large amount of 6-MAM. 3-MAM, another one of the main active metabolites of diamorphine is not nearly as potent as 6-MAM.

Seeing that you are knowledgeable on the subject could you please explain how to purify BTH? I know it has something to do with citric acid but that's all I know. I'm not even sure what form of citric acid to use. Does it have to be 100% food grade or will lemon juice suffice? Thanks for your help!

 

[kongoman]

Sorry whats BTH?

 

[daturetard]

Sorry whats BTH?

Black tar

 

[Señor Moreno]

I never tried pharma diamorphine, so I can't tell, but I have observed this phenomenom to happen, not only to me: if you were to have 100mg pharma morphine in one hand, and the exactly-exactly same amount in say a gram of opium or in a bag of brown in the other, you would be better off with the second option, hands down, every time
There is something clearly dirtier but somehow more user friendly in (good) brown street h.
Also the whole lot of alchaloids in opium tends to work better than its amount of morph isolated, after all there was a reason for Pantopón or Tebaicín (pharma opium alchs. in the % found in nature) to exist. I say that that reason still exists, but big pharma bitches don't want to produce it anymore, they just want to push their synthetic shit like tram or fent over natural occurring medicines.

Bastards.

 

[TheJuner]

Seeing that you are knowledgeable on the subject could you please explain how to purify BTH? I know it has something to do with citric acid but that's all I know. I'm not even sure what form of citric acid to use. Does it have to be 100% food grade or will lemon juice suffice? Thanks for your help!

Erowid Psychoactive Vaults

This should be of help to you. Idk about the citric acid though, sorry.