The Analgesic Properties of Numorphan (14-Hydroxy Dihydromorphinone)

SINCE the discovery of morphine a ceaseless effort has been made to improve its somnifacient and analgesic effects, and at the same time to decrease the undesirable reactions. In the past fifty years many drugs with morphinelike activity have resulted from these efforts. Some of these drugs resemble morphine and are modifications of the naturally occurring alkaloids; others are produced synthetically. Numorphan (14-hydroxy dihydromorphinone hydrochloride),§ a synthetic derivative of the alkaloid morphine (Fig. 1), differs from Dilaudid by the addition of a hydroxyl group at the fourteenth position — a change that is purported to increase its analgesic properties.1 It . . .