European Journal of Molecular & Clinical Medicine

Introduction- Opium is one of the most common substance abuse in Asian countries.In
this cross sectional study we clarify the effects of opium on respiratorysystem and possible
mechanism of respiratory involvement ,Method: The casecontrol study was done on two
groups of men between the ages of 30-50 years. Thecase group was of 100 opium addicts.
Thecontrol Group was of 100 healthy nonopium addicts. All of the 200 men underwent
spirometryand the results comparedwith each other. Result: In the opium addicts the mean
FVC was 3.10± 0.62L whichis significantly lower than normal value (4.2L in males).In
controls, the mean FVCwas 3.60±0.54L.P value for FVC was <0.001 which shows a
significant
resultstatistically.InourstudyopiumaddictsmeanFEV1was2.93±0.57Lwhichwasnearabout
normal than the standard normal values ruling out an obstructive defect. Meanvalues of
FEV1/ FVC was 94.0 ±0.13 %, highly suggestive of restrictive pulmonarydefects.
Conclusion: Opium abuse causes restrictive type of effect on pulmonaryfunction.