It also works well when taken with an anti-nausea medication. Other members of this group include alfentanil, diphenoxylate, fentanyl, loperamide, and sufentanil. The chemical structure of meperidine is similar to local anesthetics. Meperidine is recommended for relief of moderate to severe acute pain and has the unique ability to interrupt postoperative shivering and shaking chills induced by amphotericin B. Meperidine has also been used for intravenous regional anesthesia, peripheral nerve blocks and intraarticular, epidural and spinal analgesia. A high incidence of side effects limits the utility of meperidine in these situations.
Meperidine is considered a second-line agent for the treatment of acute pain.
Meperidine is commonly underprescribed in terms of dose and interval. Meperidine is metabolized to normeperidine, a compound capable of inducing seizures at high concentrations. Meperidine is not recommended for the treatment of chronic pain because of the risk of seizures with repetitive dosing and its short duration of action. Meperidine is often used as a rescue medication for treatment of Migraine, meaning used for controlling severe Migraine when a Migraineur dose not respond to abortive treatments or the Migraineur cannot use effective abortive regimes when they are contraindicated. Meperidine is available in both oral and parenteral forms and was approved by the FDA and marketed in 1942.