Oxazepam 341quency of dose along with inherent personalities of users. Hostile human re-
actions are “paradoxical” effects, meaning they are the opposite of what
normally happens after taking an oxazepam dose.
Drawbacks.While under the drug’s influence people exhibit memory trou-
ble. Oxazepam lowers body temperature in mice and rats. Case reports tell of
oxazepam causing blisters or other skin eruptions on people. In mice the sub-
stance boosts the poisonous action of the cancer medicine ifosfamide. Some
experiments using oxazepam to induce sleep find no hangover effect on per-
sons’ performance the next day, but that result is not invariable; size of dose
appears relevant. An experiment testing the drug’s effect on vigilance (an
important ability when driving a car) found normal ability while persons were
under the influence of a low dose. Another experiment using a dose four times
greater did find vigilance impairment. Still another experiment showed slower
movements.
Abuse factors.One reviewer of the drug’s characteristics reported that it
may have less addictiveness than diazepam. In one study opiate addicts found
oxazepam no more attractive than a placebo. In another study sedative abus-
ers judged the drug less attractive than diazepam and indeed mistakenly iden-
tified oxazepam as a placebo one third of the time (a mistake they almost
never made with diazepam) and even considered a placebo more appealing
than oxazepam about one fifth of the time (a preference never occurring with
diazepam). A similar experiment in which drug abusers compared oxazepam,
diazepam, and placebo produced comparable results.
An animal research study found no tolerance produced by the drug. Mon-
keys, however, exhibit signs of tolerance, dependence, and withdrawal after
taking the drug for a week or two. One human study found tolerance but no
withdrawal symptoms. Nonetheless, melancholy, mood swings, confusion,
anxiousness, panic, and seizures have been observed when doses of the drug
stopped abruptly. Some of those “withdrawal symptoms,” however, are also
conditions for which the drug is prescribed; so emergence of those conditions
upon stopping the drug may simply mean the underlying conditions were not
cured. A case report recounts a rare instance of someone having visual hal-
lucinations while undergoing oxazepam withdrawal. Tapering oxazepam does
not necessarily prevent abstinence symptoms, but symptoms have been con-
trolled by substituting another drug. One authority warns that stopping ox-
azepam can be as touchy as stopping barbiturates. In the 1980s a health official
in Australia portrayed oxazepam dependence as a growing problem. In con-
trast, another authority reviewing oxazepam’s history for a medical journal
found only four accounts of human dependence on the drug and declared
withdrawal symptoms to be unusual upon sudden stoppage. This reviewer
speculated that oxazepam’s slow delivery of drug effects and its tendency to
make people dizzy if a lot is consumed help discourage abuse.
Drug interactions.A driving skills test showed that oxazepam worsens im-
pairment induced by alcohol. Cigarette smoking shortens the time span that
an oxazepam dose stays in the body. A mouse study found that animals could
withstand higher doses ofmorphineandmethadoneif oxazepam was also
used.
Cancer.Findings about oxazepam’s potential for causing human cancer