I need to put someone to sleep with a drug

[tarkine]

One of my characters, drinks a glass of water, and wakes up a day and a half days later.

I need a medical description. So when one character asks the other "Well what did you do to her?"

The second character would say "I gave her a dose of (technical name for drug - something a medical professional would say). She should be awake in x hours.

Thanks.

[scarletpeaches]

Make them read Lord of the Rings.

[tarkine]

Originally Posted by scarletpeaches

Make them read Lord of the Rings.

No the audio book version does the job faster...I tried to listen to it while I was driving..that was a bad mistake!

[soapdish]

Trazodone.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Trazodone

I think you can OD on it and sleep for a long time, but not kill yourself. But I'm not 100% sure.

[lbender]

Why do you have to be specific?
"I gave her something to knock her out for a while. She'll be fine."
Unless they're both doctors and drug names would be more natural, I don't see the problem.

[tarkine]

Ibender - I was thinking about just saying "I gave her a sedative" - well not me, but the field medic character.. nice and vague

[cbenoi1]

> One of my characters, drinks a glass of water, and wakes up a
> day and a half days later.

I don't know of any commercial sedative taken orally that would be still active beyond 12 hours. Achieving 36 hours of sustained sedation would need an IV along with mechanical ventilation; we're talking about a hospital setup here.

There might be ways around the limitation. But more context would be needed though. Is there an accomplice available? Is that accomplice and or the bad guy willing to stick around the victim for some time?

-cb

[tarkine]

The girl is being sedated by a person who has access to medical supplies. She is being knocked out so she won't ask questions about a supernatural being... and yeah there is someone with the person.. i won't use names, just vague terms, as this will get around a lot of the issues of naming a substance.

[cbenoi1]

Then the victim injests a sedative (Valium or GHB could do fine) and gets an IV for longer-term sedation (Propofol, etc). The thing with IV sedation is that you need a doctor and/or a hospital setting around because of the risk of breathing depression. That's why you need someone to stick around to adjust the drip and take action if something wrong happens.

In the story you can always skip drug names and pretend all goes like a textbook case. Anyone with medical background will fill in the details in their mind and not feel cheated.

-cb

[ColoradoGuy]

Originally Posted by cbenoi1

Then the victim injests a sedative (Valium or GHB could do fine) and gets an IV for longer-term sedation (Propofol, etc). The thing with IV sedation is that you need a doctor and/or a hospital setting around because of the risk of breathing depression. That's why you need someone to stick around to adjust the drip and take action if something wrong happens.

In the story you can always skip drug names and pretend all goes like a textbook case. Anyone with medical background will fill in the details in their mind and not feel cheated.

-cb

Agreed. It's what I do in my day job.

If a couple of hours of sleep is all you want, there are a lot of oral options -- Valium, chloral hydrate, pentobarbital, several others. But the issue is that none of these last as long as you want. So you'd need to keep giving drugs. IV agents (like propofol, midazolam, others) can do that. But keeping the dose at the sweet spot between being asleep and stopping breathing can be a challenge, especially as the drug accumulates in the body (propofol's about the only one that doesn't accumulate much).

[cbenoi1]

Another sleezy way around would be to orally sedate the victim. When that is done (unresponsiveness), a severe concussion (visible onset of brain swelling on an X-Ray), an opened wound on the occipital bone(for the police), and ophtalmological drops in one eye (unequal pupil dilation) should be enough for an EMT / ER team to conclude the victim has a comatic brain trauma and put the patient under an induced coma for a few days. That should make doctors go scratching their heads while they figure it out, which means more time for your villain.

-cb

[Lil]

Originally Posted by cbenoi1

Another sleezy way around would be to orally sedate the victim. When that is done (unresponsiveness), a severe concussion (visible onset of brain swelling on an X-Ray), an opened wound on the occipital bone(for the police), and ophtalmological drops in one eye (unequal pupil dilation) should be enough for an EMT / ER team to conclude the victim has a comatic brain trauma and put the patient under an induced coma for a few days. That should make doctors go scratching their heads while they figure it out, which means more time for your villain.

-cb

You have a scary imagination. I like that!

[tarkine]

She's just being sedated so she won't ask questions as to why she was brought to the house to warm up her friend - and I guess the oral drugs would put her to sleep for say 8hrs, then maybe because she is exhausted before she arrives she just naturall sleeps for the other 16hrs (or so).

I've kept timelines vague, it's urban fantasy, so I can use that to my advantage.

Thanks for the advice.

[ColoradoGuy]

Originally Posted by cbenoi1

Another sleezy way around would be to orally sedate the victim. When that is done (unresponsiveness), a severe concussion (visible onset of brain swelling on an X-Ray), an opened wound on the occipital bone(for the police), and ophtalmological drops in one eye (unequal pupil dilation) should be enough for an EMT / ER team to conclude the victim has a comatic brain trauma and put the patient under an induced coma for a few days. That should make doctors go scratching their heads while they figure it out, which means more time for your villain.

-cb

I don't think that one would fool me, or any of my colleagues. Concussions, by definition, cause no changes on head CT scan. Anybody in a coma from a head injury sufficient to cause unequal pupils would have easily seen findings on CT. And the eye drops would wear off quickly.

[Becky Black]

I once slept for 19 hours after taking some co-codemol - just one pill, though I can't recall the dose. I think I'm a tad sensitive to it. But that's key as well, everyone has different reactions and sensitivities. You can't give someone a dose of a drug and say they'll be out for X number of hours. People aren't machines. Well, we are, but way more complicated machines than any we ever built ourselves.

Also there's the issue that drugs are called different things in different countries - even the generic version, not brand names. A drug that Australians or Brits say would be entirely familiar with might have Americans scratching their heads and missing the point of the dialogue.

[tarkine]

Originally Posted by Becky Black

I once slept for 19 hours after taking some co-codemol - just one pill, though I can't recall the dose. I think I'm a tad sensitive to it. But that's key as well, everyone has different reactions and sensitivities. You can't give someone a dose of a drug and say they'll be out for X number of hours. People aren't machines. Well, we are, but way more complicated machines than any we ever built ourselves.

Also there's the issue that drugs are called different things in different countries - even the generic version, not brand names. A drug that Australians or Brits say would be entirely familiar with might have Americans scratching their heads and missing the point of the dialogue.

Another good reason to leave it vague. thanks.

[ColoradoGuy]

Originally Posted by tarkine

She's just being sedated so she won't ask questions as to why she was brought to the house to warm up her friend - and I guess the oral drugs would put her to sleep for say 8hrs, then maybe because she is exhausted before she arrives she just naturall sleeps for the other 16hrs (or so).

That's actually quite common. I do a lot of sedation for procedures in children. Often if the child has been tired, upset, stressed before the sedation they arouse from the drug when it wears off, then go back to sleep for a while.