What is curare used for?
curare, drug belonging to the alkaloid family of organic compounds, derivatives of which are used in modern medicine primarily as skeletal muscle relaxants, being administered concomitantly with general anesthesia for certain types of surgeries, particularly those of the chest and the abdomen.
What is a curare in medical terms?
Curare: A muscle relaxant used in anesthesia (and, in the past, in arrow poisons by South American Indians). Curare competes with acetylcholine, a chemical that carries information between nerve and muscle cells, and blocks transmission of the information.
What is a curare in psychology?
n. any of various toxic plant extracts, especially extracts from plants of the genus Strychnos. Curare and related compounds exert their effects by blocking the activity of acetylcholine at neuromuscular junctions, resulting in paralysis.
What is curare an example of?
Curare is an example of a non-depolarizing muscle relaxant that blocks the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR), one of the two types of acetylcholine (ACh) receptors.
What does curare do to the heart?
Death from curare is caused by asphyxia, because the skeletal muscles become relaxed and then paralyzed. In 1811, Sir Benjamin Brodie noted that during curare poisoning the heart continues to beat, even after breathing stops, which means that heart function is not stopped by curare.
Is curare still used today?
Curare is the historical prototype of nondepolarization neuromuscular blockers, but it is no longer used clinically. Curare (also called D-tubocurare) was the first paralytic used in anesthesia, but it has been replaced by newer agents.
How does curare cause death?
As a potent muscle relaxant, curare can cause death quickly by inducing asphyxia due to rapid relaxation of diaphragmatic muscles. According to one source, death from respiratory arrest can take place within a few minutes in birds and small prey, and up to 20 min in larger mammals.
Can you drink curare?
It is harmless if taken orally because curare compounds are too large and highly charged to pass through the lining of the digestive tract to be absorbed into the blood. For this reason, people can safely eat curare-poisoned prey, and it has no effect on its flavor.
Why does curare not affect the heart?
Its vapors are not poisonous, although natives believed they were. In 1811, Sir Benjamin Brodie noted that during curare poisoning the heart continues to beat, even after breathing stops, which means that heart function is not stopped by curare.
Is curare used today?
What does curare smell like?
It plays a vital role in the Sussex Vampire, one of the 56 short stories. It is no surprise that Conan Doyle incorporated poisons into several of the Sherlock sagas because he was a medical doctor. But it seems he didn’t have any practical experience with curare,or he would have noted that it has no smell.
What does the name curare mean?
Use curare in a sentence. noun. The definition of curare is a black poisonous substance from certain South American plants, applied to arrows by some native South Americans. An example of curare is a white-tailed deer being shot by an arrow and becoming unable to move.
What does curare mean?
Medical Definition of curare. : a dried aqueous extract especially of a vine (as Strychnos toxifera of the family Loganiaceae or Chondodendron tomentosum of the family Menispermaceae) that produces muscle relaxation and is used in arrow poisons by South American Indians — compare tubocurarine.
What effect does curare have on muscle tissue?
Curare is an alkaloid, and acts as a neuromuscular blocking agent to produce paralysis in muscles. It first affects the muscles of the toes, ears, and eyes, then those of the neck, arms and legs, and finally, those involved in breathing.
What is curare a poison works by?
Curare is a common name for various plant extract alkaloid arrow poisons originating from indigenous peoples in Central and South America. Used as a paralyzing agent for hunting and for therapeutic purposes, Curare only becomes active by a direct wound contamination by a poison dart or arrow or via injection. These poisons function by competitively and reversibly inhibiting the nicotinic acetylcholine receptor , which is a subtype of acetylcholine receptor found at the neuromuscular junction. Thi