it’s an age old question, ibuprofen or acetaminophen What’s the difference?
Hey guys, Julia here for DNews.
I got a migraine recently and popped a few ibuprofen and felt so much better, but that
made me wonder how do major pain relievers actually reduce pain?
Well, there are special receptors in your body that respond specifically to pain called
nociceptors.
They protect us by responding to potentially damaging stimuli like a burn or a cut and
send a signal fast to the brain.
Once your brain gets the signal, “OUCH THIS HURTS” your body is already going to work
to heal the wound.
Most injuries get hot and swollen, but this is your body trying to protect itself, by
swelling, the body might prevent further injury by immobilizing a joint or whatever and the
heat might be the result of increased blood flow or might cause increased blood flow which
means more healing immune cells get to the point of injury.
Another thing injured cells release is arachidonic acid.
Two enzymes, COX 1 and COX 2 react with this acid to produce prostaglandins.
These can create other chemicals which are responsible for all that swelling, heat and
pain.
And this seems to be the target mechanism of non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drugs,
like ibuprofen.
Ibuprofen was discovered in the 1960s and in 1983 was made available over the counter.
It’s originally designed to be an anti-inflammatory drug.
It works by stopping the production of prostaglandins by blocking one of the active sites of COX
1 and COX 2.
When ibuprofen is in the active site, arachidonic acid can’t fit so prostaglandins can’t
be made and thus the heat and pain-causing swelling is reduced.
Acetaminophen on the other hand, isn’t an anti-inflammatory drug.
How it works..
well gets a little complicated.
It was first discovered in the late 1800s and really didn’t reach the market until
1955 when it was marketed as Tylenol.
And really, nobody's really sure how it works.
I’m not kidding, there are a lot of ideas, but nothing conclusive yet.
In 2002, scientists in England discovered another COX enzyme, and they labelled it COX
3.
This new enzyme can be found mostly in the brain and it seems more sensitive to acetaminophen
than other anti pain medications.
But unfortunately this only seemed true in tests with other animals.
Another idea is that acetaminophen works differently on COX enzymes.
They have two active sites, one that arachidonic acid binds with and another, the peroxidase
site which leads to production of a tyrosine radical.
It’s this other active site that acetaminophen might bind with, preventing the body from
making this compound, relieving some pain.
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Or another idea… and this one is my personal favorite.
Researchers from Lund University, in Sweden think acetaminophen actually works on the
endocannabinoid system.
If that word sounds a little familiar to you, yes, it’s the system that respond to cannabis
or weed.
But it’s also involved in a lot of different processes like appetite, pain-sensation, mood,
and memory.
So the researchers claim that acetaminophen activates two ion channels in the brain and
spinal cord and that these channels also respond to certain cannabinoids.
But the researchers caution that these channels can actually trigger pain and itch responses,
so it seems odd that activating them reduces pain.
But they might be on to something.
Another study published in the European Journal of Pharmacology shows that that blocking cannabinoid
receptor type 1 prevents acetaminophen from relieving pain in mice.
And there’s a few other ideas of how the drug works, like maybe it works on serotonin
receptors, but who really knows right now.
So even for a drug as old as acetaminophen…
it’s clear more research is needed.
Alright guys, the question is, are you a fan of ibuprofen or acetaminophen?
Does one work better for you than the other?
Let us know..