Triazolam
Pronunciation:try-A ̄-zoh-lam
Chemical Abstracts Service Registry Number:28911-01-5
Formal Names:Halcion
Type:Depressant (benzodiazepine class).Seepage 21
Federal Schedule Listing:Schedule IV (DEA no. 2887)
USA Availability:Prescription
Pregnancy Category:X
Uses.Triazolam became available for medical use in the United States dur-
ing the 1980s. The substance is supposed to be used for treating insomnia on
a short-term basis (typically one or two weeks), but sometimes prescribers tell
patients to take the medicine for months. A brief insomnia rebound can occur
when people stop taking the drug, meaning that for a night or two they have
more trouble sleeping than before they used the drug. Another medical ap-
plication of the drug is to make patients less nervous as they await dental
work.
Experiments indicate the substance can help workers change their sleep
schedules. In a simulated transportation of troops into combat, however, tria-
zolam was unhelpful in shifting the sleep schedule of soldiers; and in a mil-
itary exercise flying soldiers from the United States to the Middle East, the
drug failed to produce adequate sleep. In still another experiment, the U.S.
Army noted that the drug can induce sleep under adverse conditions but that
soldiers will not do as well as normal if forced to perform while under tria-
zolam’s influence. A military experiment tested whether the drug could affect
ability to engage in cold temperature operations, with ambiguous results.
Murders have been committed using triazolam in a beverage to make victims
defenseless against attack. The substance is 4 to 34 times stronger thandiaze-
pam, 40 times stronger thanzolpidem, and 1,000 times stronger thanchloral
hydrate; and it is normally considered about 60 times stronger thanflurazepam
andtemazepam, but that normal assumption has been questioned by research-
ers examining those drugs’ potencies. For some effects, such as memory im-
pairment and control of body appendages, triazolam is hundreds of times
stronger thanpentobarbital. Despite triazolam’s inherent strength, experi-
ments show its effects as no greater than other benzodiazepine class depres-
sants if doses are adjusted to compensate for strength differences.