Misc Guaifenesin as an NMDA Antagonist?

[chicken hoagie]

In buying a pack of Primatene asthma medication for use as ephedrine, I wanted to revisit the side effects of guaifenesin. I learned that guaifenesin has anticonvulsant and muscle relaxant properties akin to possible NMDA antagonism.

Has anyone else heard or looked into this? Is it possible that guaifenesin could cause effects similar to other NMDA antagonists like ketamine or DXM?

 

[negrogesic]

The amount of guaifenesin in a single primatene tablet is pretty low and almost imperceptible (200mg). I used to take bronkaid (which contain 25mg ephedrine/400mg guaifenesin) and you can start to feel the sedating effects of the guaifenesin at that level. I find the guaifenesin hits faster than the ephedrine, so first you feel a little drowsy and relaxed, and then the ephedrine full kicks in. The ephedrine in primatene is faster acting however as it is in the hcl form (rather than the ephedrine sulfate that is in bronkaid).

Guaifenesin does not feel much like an NMDA antagonist but rather more like a muscle relaxant. It feels most like methocarbamol, which isn't surprising as they are structurally very similar. It feels nothing like ketamine etc.

If you take guaifenesin frequently you need to drink alot of water because its can cause kidney stones. I used to take 3-4 bronkaid a day and i feel like it messed up my kidneys.

 

[Anonymous Dissident]

Wow. I've been taking 2400mg/day to help clear out the crud in my lungs (fine particulate matter present in the omnipresent wildfire smoke) and haven't noticed any kind of effects, relaxing or otherwise. Is it one of those substances that just comes down to individual metabolism? Maybe its because I'm using a time release formulation? I'm not going to take it recreationally, just curious as I had never seen this before.

 

[sekio]

I never found guaifensin to have any psychoactive effects at all, it mostly just thins my mucus. Certainly not a dissociative.

Studies show that it does indeed have muscle relaxing properties in humans at doses of 600-1200mg.