RESPIRATORY EFFECTS OF COCAINE FREEBASING AMONG HABITUAL COCAINE USERS (FROM COCAINE: PHYSIOLOGICAL AND PHYSIOPATHOLOGICAL EFFECTS, P 59-70, 1992, ALFONSO PAREDES AND DAVID A GORELICK, EDS.)

• NCJ Number: 141647
• Author(s): D P Tashkin; D Gorelick; M E Khalsa; M Simmons; P Chang
• Date Published: 1992
• Length: 12 pages
• Sale Source: Haworth Press, Inc
• Publication Type: Report (Study/Research)
• Language: English
• Country: United States of America

Annotation

So as to assess further the relationship between frequent cocaine smoking and respiratory symptoms and lung dysfunction, this study examined a sample of 177 heavy, habitual smokers of freebase cocaine (mean 6.6 gm/wk for an average of 27 months) with or without concomitant smoking of tobacco and/or marijuana.

Abstract

Results in this sample were compared with those in a control sample of 75 age-matched, sex-matched, and race- matched nonsmokers of cocaine who did or did not also smoke tobacco and/or marijuana. After controlling for the use of other smoked substances, heavy, habitual cocaine smoking was associated with a high frequency of acute respiratory symptoms in temporal association with freebase use, an obstructive ventilatory abnormality that involves the large airways, and a mild but significant impairment in the diffusing capacity of the lungs. These findings suggest that heavy, habitual crack smoking produces respiratory-tract injury manifested by acute respiratory symptoms and evidence of chronic airflow obstruction in large airways, and an abnormality in diffusion of gas at the alveolar-capillary level. The mechanism of the diffusion defect is unknown but could reflect damage to the alveolar-capillary membrane. Further study of the magnitude, persistence reversibility, mechanism, and clinical significance of the abnormality in diffusing capacity is needed. 1 figure and 32 references