Life is Full with Chemistry

Thursday, May 21, 2009

Aspirin

Lately one of my posting was out of topic, I’m very stress due to too many work on hand to work on and have some family matter to care of. Eventually the consumption of aspirin increases in my daily life. I’m a person which could get sick easily even standing under the hot sunny afternoon will give me a bad headache. Just the few days I had been consuming a lot of aspirin. Then this idea comes into my mind to write about it and get to know about it more and the side effect.

Let get to know what is aspirin and its history.

I’ll make it a short one; I’m having some depression when doing this posting.
During the ancient time, salicylic-rich willow bark extract was known to relieve fever, inflammation and muscle and joint aches. Hippocrates (father of modern medicine during 460 B.C and 377 B.C) left historical records of usage of powder made from leaves and bark of willow tree help to heal headaches and pains. During the 19th century, pharmacists start to research and experiment variety of chemicals related to salicylic acid (a component of willow extract).

During 1829, scientists discovered the actual compound which relief pain was salicin. Henri Leroux was able extracted salicin in crystalline form for the first time and Raffaele Piria succeeded obtaining pure state of salicylic acid. When salicylic acid was tested, the effect was negative; therefore a buffering compound was researched. In 1853, Charles Frederic Gerhardt was able to neutralized salicylic acid by buffering with acetyl chloride and sodium which created acetylsalicylic acid.

In 1899, Felix Hoffmann rediscovered Gerhardt’s formula and made acetylsalicylic acid a less-irritating replacement for standard common salicylate medicines. Felix Hoffmann was working under a German company called Bayer. Bayer came up with the name Aspirin which comes from the “a” in acetyl chloride, the “spir” in spiraea ulmaria (plant which derived salicylic acid) and “in” was a familiar ending name for medicines. Aspirin was sold in powder form but in 1915 Aspirin tablets were made.

How interesting Aspirin was made from a plant. So it should be a healthy product I guess. Let me get deeper into its chemistry.

Aspirin or also known as acetylsalicylic acid, which is a salicylate drug which use as analgesic(painkiller) to relieve minor pain and aches, also as antipyretic(drug reduce body temperature) to reduce fever and reduce inflammation ( a complex response of vascular tissue to harmful stimuli.)

How modern aspirin is made?? It is through an esterification reaction where salicylic acid is treated with acetic anhydride cause the phenol group of salicylic acid to change into acetyl group (R-OH -> R- OCOCH3),

and small amount of sulfuric acid is added as catalyst. Aspirin is name as 2-acetoxybenzoic acid under IUPAC.

Hmmm... This posting seem getting abit longer than I expected. This topic gave me some driving power to write more and research more on it. So let get to the point which everyone should know before and after taking aspirin and effect of it.

I found out some important information I would like to let you know about it (especially to new parent) XD. Aspirin should never be given to children, especially when the child having chicken pox or flu symptoms BECAUSE aspirin could cause a fatal condition called as Reye’s syndrome in children.(Reye’s syndrome is a fatal disease that cause detrimental effect on brain and liver which causes inflammation and severe encephalopathy [brain swelling].)(Be careful on that!!). One more reminder to those alcoholic, don ever consume aspirin after drinking alcohol, it could increase the risk of stomach bleeding.

Do you know if you have certain disorder you couldn’t consume aspirin? Want to know which disorder is that?

If you have: bleeding disorder (i.e. hemophilia), stomach or intestinal bleeding, asthma, liver disease, kidney disease, heart disease, high blood pressure, gout and nasal polyps. You couldn’t consume aspirin which will cause a lot of side effect and internal injuries. So do be careful when consuming.

Those are the precaution you should know before consume aspirin. How about overdosing of aspirin? (I think I’m a real life specimen now) ha ha. .

Overdosing of aspirin could causes double vision and uncontrollable shaking seizures of muscle. It could also cause drowsiness and causes our body to feel restless which would affect our consciousness and nervousness. On top of that it would lead to vomiting due to stomach disorder and causes burning throat. Indirectly would decrease urination. (Those didn’t happen on me. Conclude that, I didn’t overdose of aspirin! SAFE!)

I just found out something interesting about aspirin.

1) Able to keep flowers remain fresh for a longer period of time. How? Drop a soluble aspirin tablet into the water before putting the flower into the vase.

2) Could prevent fungus forming around roots of new plants. How? Mixing aspirin into potting composition when doing gardening.

3) Treat dandruff problem. How? Mixing 2 tablet of aspirin into the shampoo.

4) Aids for pimples. How? Crush the aspirin tablet and add some water to make it into paste form and cover it on the pimple.

5) Removing stain. How? Add 2 aspirins in half-filled warm water and apply on the stain and wash the cloth after several hours.

~Jasonyap~