Ephedrine Psychosis Rediscovered

The use of ephedrine for medicinal purposes dates back over 5000 years, when native Chinese physicians Ma Huang in the late 1800s, but was considered too toxic for clinical use; it was rediscovered by Chen & Schmidt (1930), who demonstrated its sympatho mimetic action and introduced it into Western medicine, where it was found to be a big improvement on adrenaline in the treatment of asthma. That the structure of ephedrine is very similar to that of amphetamine is not a coincidence, since Alles (1933) synthesised the latter as a synthetic substitute for ephedrine.