Oral, eating or swallowing

Eating or swallowing drugs is a slow route of administration. In your stomach, the drugs come into contact with an acidic environment and digestive enzymes. Which means that a part of the drugs can be broken down. The drugs are absorbed into the bloodstream via the stomach, but mostly the small intestine. The blood from the small intestine then first flows to the liver. Here again partial degradation can take place. Only then does the blood flow to the heart and the rest of the body before it reaches the brain. Because of the long road the drugs have to travel, it takes 30 to 90 minutes (depending on the stomach contents) before you feel the first effects. Because part of the drug is already broken down by the liver (this is called the first pass effect) before it reaches the brain, a higher dose is often needed than with other routes of administration.

The disadvantage of eating or swallowing drugs is that it is more difficult to regulate the effect. It takes quite a while before you feel anything. And thus to figure out whether it was a good dose. If you’ve taken too much, you can’t go back.

For example: swallowing an ecstasy pill or speed bomb, drinking alcohol, eating space cake.