Effects - Cocaine a better pain reliever than opioids?!?

[kailey_elise]

Hi there. I'm mostly a lurker, though I do post occasionally when I think I might have an answer better than those already posted or a question not currently asked - like today.

A friend of mine ("SF") suffers with a chronic pain condition and is prescribed opiates (methadone & dilaudid) for the pain. Apparently, the pain has gotten much worse as of late; I was IMing with "SF" last night as many things were tried in an attempt to alleviate the pain: an additional 10mg methadone on top of the usual dose (I think it was 100mg in all by the end), 6mg Dilaudid orally, 1 frozen mudslide drink (vodka & Kaluha w/milk & coffee ice cream), 1 screwdriver drink (vodka w/oragne peach juice), then 10mg Dilaudid plugged (crushed, dissolved in water, then administered via enema), 30 minutes later another 6mg Dilaudid plugged, 1 hour later a final 4mg Dilaudid plugged, for a total of 20mg Dilaudid plugged & 6mg orally. "SF" intimated that no more was taken out of fear.

Apparently, not only was the pain still, well, painful, "SF" reported no real buzz - just a slight one for about 2 minutes after finishing the screwdriver.

Flash forward to this morning, pain is reported to be the same (even after "SF" took the normal morning dose of methadone, 30mg), but a friend came over in the early afternoon with some cocaine. "SF" partook of the cocaine and felt better - said the pain wasn't totally removed or anything, but it helped - MUCH more than the opiates.

Any ideas on how this could be? What chemicals/parts of the brain would cocaine hit that opiates wouldn't/didn't? Could the cocaine actually just be potentiating (sp?) the opiates and making them work better? And although this isn't the correct forum, anyone know why 20mg of Dilaudid plugged didn't work (not even a buzz to at least forget about the pain!), but 2 lines of cocaine did?

Man, I felt (and continue to feel) so bad for "SF", and I worry too, with the large doses of narcotics seemingly needed to make the pain subside. :'(

Thanks in advance for any help anyone can provide!

~K.Elise