A study from the University of Arizona suggests intermittent fasting could play a role in improving opioid addiction treatment. The research began with the curiosity of then-student David Duron, who has since earned his Ph.D., about how fasting might affect opioid treatment.
The research team, using mice, implemented a six-hour daily fasting window during a week of opioid injection treatment. John Streicher, Ph.D., the study’s corresponding author, noted this was the first investigation into intermittent fasting’s impact on opioids.
After the treatment week, mice in the fasting group showed pain relief that was better and lasted longer compared to non-fasting mice, including in a post-surgical pain model. A key finding was that the increased effectiveness did not come with worse side effects.
Streicher explained that opioids activate the brain’s reward circuit, which is the foundation of addiction. Control mice, which ate freely, showed the expected reward response to morphine. However, the fasting mice showed no evidence of that reward or of learning to associate a euphoric effect with the drug.
The study indicates intermittent fasting could potentially help people on opioid therapy by improving treatment benefits while reducing addiction risk, if results in humans are similar. Other side effects were also lessened.
Tolerance to opioids, which often requires increasing dosage, rose by as much as 100% in the control group. The fasting group saw only about a 40% increase in tolerance. The fasting mice also experienced less constipation and recovered from the drugs’ effects more quickly.
Streicher said the combined results suggest opioid side effects are reduced while efficacy improves, which is an optimal outcome for any treatment. The connection to improved gut health from fasting may explain the constipation findings.
The team aims to conduct further studies and clinical trials to understand the brain mechanisms affecting opioid receptors and side effects. Streicher pointed out that testing a dietary change like fasting can happen much faster than developing a new drug, which requires years and FDA approval.
Based on these findings, efforts are already underway to set up a clinical trial where patients on opioid pain therapy follow an intermittent fasting diet to observe the effects. The broader research into intermittent fasting continues to examine its various potential impacts on health and treatment protocols.
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