ATC Group: N02AC Diphenylpropylamine derivatives

The World Health Organization's ATC classification organizes medical drugs based on therapeutic properties, chemical composition, and anatomy. It helps make essential medicines readily available globally and is widely used in the pharmaceutical industry.

Position of N02AC in the ATC hierarchy

Level Code Title
1 N Nervous system
2 N02 Analgesics
3 N02A Opioids
4 N02AC Diphenylpropylamine derivatives

Group N02AC contents

Code Title
N02AC01 Dextromoramide
N02AC03 Piritramide
N02AC04 Dextropropoxyphene
N02AC05 Bezitramide
N02AC52 Methadone, comb. excl. psycholeptics
N02AC54 Dextropropoxyphene, comb. excl. psycholeptics
N02AC74 Dextropropoxyphene, comb. with psycholeptics

Active ingredients in N02AC

Active Ingredient Description
Dextromoramide

Dextromoramide is a powerful opioid analgesic approximately three times more potent than morphine but shorter acting. The main advantage of this drug is that it has a fast onset of action when taken orally, and has a high bioavailability which means that oral dosing produces almost as much effect as injection. It also has a relatively low tendency to cause constipation which is a common problem with opioid analgesics used for cancer pain relief, and tolerance to the analgesic effects develops relatively slowly compared to most other short-acting opioids.

Dextropropoxyphene

Propoxyphene, a synthetic opiate agonist, is structurally similar to methadone. Its general pharmacologic properties are those of the opiates as a group. The analgesic effect of propoxyphene is due to the d-isomer, dextropropoxyphene. It binds to the opiate receptors and leads to a decrease of the perception of pain stimuli. Propoxyphene possesses little to no antitussive activity and no antipyretic action.

Piritramide

Piritramide is a pure ยต-opioid receptor agonist, which has a slightly less analgesic potency than morphine. Analgesia results from activation of the ยต-opioid receptors in the spine and the higher pain centres such as the thalamus and cerebral cortex, thereby raising the pain threshold and the sensitivity to pain.