SCIENCE / MEDICINE : Drug Answer to Tranquilizers

USC scientists have found that a new drug called flumazenil can effectively reverse the effects of an overdose of Valium, Librium and related tranquilizers. Flumazenil also reverses the effect of the drugs when they are used as an anesthetic in surgery.

“Surgery patients were totally awake within minutes of receiving (it),” said anesthesiologist Stephen Steen. “You wouldn’t know they had had anesthesia.”

In a study of 20 orthopedic surgery patients who received the drug and 10 who did not, Steen found that those who got flumazenil were significantly more alert at 5 minutes and 15 minutes after the surgery, he reported at a meeting of the Sixth World Conference on Emergency and Disaster Medicine.

“It’s a great advantage to have patients awake so soon because you can far more easily assess if there are any problems medically, surgically, or with the anesthesia,” he said.