Clinical evaluation of three long-acting anticholinergic compounds.

Anticholinergic drugs are used widely in the treatment of peptic ulcer, though their value is disputed. The ideal preparation should be long-acting, and should reduce gastric acid secretion throughout both day and night without causing side effects. Short-acting preparations were shown to inhibit gastric secretion only in doses which produced side effects (Sun and Shay, 1955). Different conclusions were reached by Mitchell, Hunt, and Grossman (1962), who found that both atropine and poldine, a longer-acting synthetic compound, inhibited gastric secretion without causing side effects. Such disagreement may in part be due to differences in methods of assessing anticholinergic agents. But doubt remains as to whether side effects are a necessary accompaniment to the effective treatment of peptic ulcer with anticholinergic drugs. In this report, we have examined some of the available long-acting preparations. Measurement of salivary flow has been used to assess their duration of action. We have also compared the effects of the different preparations on visual accommodation, salivary flow, and gastric acid secretion.