ANTICONVULSANT PROPERTIES OF CERTAIN SECONDARY AND TERTIARY ALCOHOLS

¹ Department of Pharmacology and Therapeutics, Stanford University School of Medicine, San Francisco

A variety of secondary and tertiary alcohols was tested for the ability to modify electrical maximal seizures and cortical threshold in rats. Evaluated by the "protective index", nine carbinols were found to be superior to methylparafynol and one of the nine (2-phenyl-butanol-2) ranked favorably with phenobarbital.

For our data the most effective carbinols were simple secondary and tertiary propanols, butanols, and pentanols, with at least one phenyl group. A vinyl group was not necessary for anticonvulsant action.

Used as the diluent for gastric administration, propylene glycol appeared to enhance the anticonvulsant activity of the alcohols.

After a single gastric dose, all but one of the carbinols imparted protection against maximal seizures in excess of six hours.

In chronic experiments, none of the more promising alcohols caused inhibition of food or water consumption, depression of erythrocyte or leucocyte counts, or detectable pathology at necropsy. Growth of male rats was slightly retarded by 1-phenyl-2-methyl-butanol-2 and by 3-pentanol, whereas that of females was slightly inhibited by 2-methyl-propanol-2.