Amnesic action of and skills related to driving after intravenous flunitrazepam

Amnesic action, skills related to driving and the ability to discriminate the fusion of flickering light were measured double-blind in 29 healthy volunteers before and after three doses of intravenous flunitrazepam. Every subject experienced amnesia for the pinching of the abdomen after being injected with flunitrazepam. Even the smallest dose of flunitrazepam (0.01 mg/kg) caused the amnesia without affecting the level of consciousness. The late effects of flunitrazepam were the most harmful to coordination. With 0.01 mg/kg eye-hand coordination was slightly impaired for as long as 6 h after the injection, and after 0.02 and 0.03 mg/kg the impairment was still significant (P less than 0.05) at the last observation period 10 h after the injection. It was concluded that, because the amnesic action of flunitrazepam is more effective than that of clinically comparable doses of diazepam, further clinical experiments with flunitrazepam are warranted. Its longer and more harmful effects on psychomotor performance than those of equipotent doses of diazepam suggest that doses of 0.02 mg/kg or more of flunitrazepam should be avoided in outpatient anaesthesia or sedation.