Amoxicillin-clavulanic acid 100 day treatment was shown to have significant effect on chronic low back pain yet straight penicillin did not. Recent works on clavulanic drugs has demonstrated it can lower brain glutamate levels (pain transmitter) and help with withdrawal and addiction.
Alasmari, Mohammed S., et al.
Effects of beta lactams on behavioral outcomes of substance use disorders: a meta-analysis of preclinical studies.
Neuroscience 537 (2024): 58-83.
https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0306452223005092
- “Preclinical studies demonstrated that beta-lactams have neuroprotective effects in conditions involving glutamate neuroexcitotoxicity, including substance use disorders (SUDs)”
- “using these beta-lactams… was found to be correlated with decreasing the extracellular glutamate concentrations in the brain (Das et al., 2015)
Comments – clavulanic acid might attenuate addiction, withdrawal and chronic pain but further study is necessary