Possible Interaction: Ethanol and Nitroglycerin

“ Chronic ethanol exposure reduced the agonist-stimulated formation of inositol 1,4,5-trisphosphate in NG 108-15 cells and in SH-SY5Y cells.”

“An optimal concentration range of aqueous ethanol produces 5-10-fold increases in nitroglycerin flux across skin and ethanol skin permeation that are far greater than reported previously.”

“… ethanol … injectable nitroglycerin is potentially hazardous, because of the possibility of cardiodcpression, arrhythmias and/or coronary vasospasm; neurotoxicity and depression of the central nervous system; hyperosmolality, … in patients with diminished renal function; interaction with disulfiram and compounds with a disulfiram-like action; interaction with oral antidiabetics and with heparin.”

“Excerpt To the editor: Shook and associates (1) have reported in a recent issue two cases of ethanol intoxication in patients receiving high doses of intravenous nitroglycerin.”

“Results showed that nitroglycerin significantly attenuated the number and length of mucosal lesions induced by acidified ethanol.”

“ Ethanol reduced the ratio from 1.65 +/- 0.47 in the control to 0.86 +/- 0.13 (p less than 0.001) and the reduction was prevented by nitroglycerin to 1.25 +/- 0.23 (p less than 0.01).”

“It is concluded that nitroglycerin prevented the impairment of free radical formation of the mitochondria induced by ethanol , presumably by a mitochondrial membrane-stabilizing action.”

“Biofilm-eradicating activity was sustained when the ethanol concentration was increased from 20 to 22% which fully compensated for reducing the citrate concentration from 7% to 4% as well as the nitroglycerin concentration from 0.01% to 0.0015% or 0.003%.”