Search

The reinforcing effects of (−)-cathinone, a pharmacologically active ingredient of khat, and 2-amino-1-(2,5-dimethoxy-4-methyl)phenylpropane ((STP) (DOM)), a hallucinogenic psychotomimetic, were studied by intravenous self-administration experiments in rhesus monkeys. Among the experiments described in this paper, the result of continuous self-administration of (−)-cathinone was briefly reported elsewhere. T. Yanagita, Studies on Cathinones, NIDA Research Monograph 27, Proceedings of 41st Annual Scientific Meeting of the Committee on Problems of Drug Dependence, 1979, pp. 326–327.

Risk assessment of dependence-producing drugs comprises assessment of two major risks: the risk that a drug is likely to be abused (abuse liability) and the harm that is likely to occur as a consequence of abuse (termed here as harm liability). Important determinants of these risks are the dependence-related pharmacological and toxicological properties of a drug. In this paper, the relationships of the drug properties to the abuse and harm liabilities are described. Next, a scoring system to assess the abuse and harm liabilities is introduced. Finally, an attempt to actually apply this system to several prototypic drugs of abuse and some agonist-antagonist analgesics is explained.