Papaverine
Papaverine is an injectable muscle relaxer used for conditions involving smooth muscle spasm, including spasm of blood vessels (such as with heart attack, angina, or blood clots in the arteries) and spasm in the gut, bile ducts, or urinary tract.
🧬 Where this information comes from Click to expand
The clinical label records used on this page are FDA-filed Structured Product Labeling (SPL) retrieved through openFDA. We identified 4 clinical label sets within the page’s selected clinical scope after exact ingredient or ingredient-combination matching and applicable route/form matching. Forms, routes, brands, labelers, strengths, and NDC product-record counts are built separately from matching FDA National Drug Code Directory records. The linked DailyMed document is a representative official source for verification, not the page’s only clinical source. View the linked label on DailyMed →
Papaverine is an older standby injection that directly relaxes smooth muscle (the involuntary muscle of blood vessels and organs), used for blood vessel spasm with a heart attack, angina (chest pain), or clots in limbs or lungs, and for gut, bile duct, or urinary colic; it has been on the U.S. market since about 1995 and is available generically. Most people tolerate it fairly well, with flushing, sweating, nausea, or headache the usual complaints. The main concern is the heart, so the vein form must go in slowly, is never used in complete heart block (a serious wiring problem), and a racing or irregular heartbeat needs reporting right away.
Clinical pearls
- It is given only by a healthcare professional, into a vein when speed matters or into a muscle otherwise.
- Strong flushing, drowsiness, or weakness right after the injection should be reported to the nurse at once.
- It is not approved for penile injection for impotence, which has caused prolonged, painful erections needing medical and surgical care.
- Mention any liver disease first, and report yellowing skin or eyes or dark urine, since hepatitis has been reported.
Patient information guide A plain-language walkthrough of Papaverine, written from its FDA label.
What Papaverine is used for
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Papaverine hydrochloride injection is used for conditions with smooth muscle spasm:
- Vascular spasm with acute myocardial infarction (heart attack)
- Angina pectoris
- Peripheral and pulmonary embolism
- Peripheral vascular disease with a vasospastic (spasm) element
- Certain cerebral angiospastic states (spasm of brain arteries)
- Visceral spasm, such as ureteral, biliary, or gastrointestinal colic
How Papaverine works
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Papaverine relaxes smooth muscle, especially when it is tightly contracted. It appears to act directly on the muscle, not through the nerves. The muscle can still respond to other things that make it contract.
It relaxes larger blood vessels, including those of the heart, brain, limbs, and lungs. It also relaxes muscle in the airways, gut, bile ducts, and urinary tract.
Papaverine dosage
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Papaverine hydrochloride is given by injection into a vein or a muscle. The vein route is recommended when an immediate effect is desired, and it is injected slowly over 1 or 2 minutes to avoid uncomfortable or alarming side effects.
Injected doses may be repeated about every 3 hours as indicated. For certain irregular heartbeats (cardiac extrasystoles), 2 doses may be given 10 minutes apart. Your prescriber decides the exact amount.
Dosing details from the FDA-approved label
From the Papaverine prescribing information (“Dosage and Administration”). Doses are set by your prescriber for your product, condition, kidney function and age — never change a dose on your own.
- Parenteral administration (general)
- 1 to 4 mL repeated every 3 hours as indicated
- May be administered intravenously or intramuscularly
- The intravenous route is recommended when an immediate effect is desired, injected slowly over the course of 1 or 2 minutes
- Inject slowly over 1 or 2 minutes to avoid uncomfortable or alarming side effects
- Cardiac extrasystoles
- 2 doses may be given 10 minutes apart
Read the label’s full dosing text
DOSAGE AND ADMINISTRATION Papaverine Hydrochloride may be administered intravenously or intramuscularly. The intravenous route is recommended when an immediate effect is desired, but the drug must be injected slowly over the course of 1 or 2 minutes to avoid uncomfortable or alarming side effects. Parenteral administration of papaverine hydrochloride in doses of 1 to 4 mL is repeated every 3 hours as indicated. In the treatment of cardiac extrasystoles, 2 doses may be given 10 minutes apart.
Read the full Dosage and Administration section on DailyMed →
Papaverine side effects
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Side effects reported with papaverine include:
Common side effects
- Nausea
- Abdominal discomfort
- Loss of appetite
- Constipation or diarrhea
- Headache
- Dizziness or spinning feeling (vertigo)
- Flushing of the face and sweating
- Skin rash
- General discomfort or malaise
- Intense facial flushing and sweating
- Deeper breathing
- Faster heart rate and a slight rise in blood pressure
- Excessive sedation
When to get medical help
- Seek medical help right away if you have signs of liver problems, since hepatitis has been reported infrequently and rarely progressed to cirrhosis.
- Tell your care team right away about a fast heartbeat, strong flushing, or feeling very drowsy or weak after the injection.
- Get urgent help for a heart rhythm problem if you feel irregular or racing heartbeats.
- Call a poison control center or emergency services if too much has been given.
Papaverine warnings and precautions
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- Complete atrioventricular heart block: intravenous papaverine should not be used. It may cause temporary abnormal rhythms from the lower heart chambers.
- Penile injection: not indicated for impotence. It has caused persistent priapism needing medical and surgical treatment.
- Liver effects: hepatitis, probably immune-related, has been reported infrequently.
Before taking Papaverine
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- Tell your care team if you have a heart conduction problem such as heart block.
- Papaverine is not indicated for treating impotence by injection into the penis.
- Mention any liver problems, since the drug is processed in the liver.
Papaverine overdose
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Too much papaverine can cause nausea, vomiting, weakness, drowsiness or central nervous system depression, eye movement and double vision problems, sweating, flushing, dizziness, and a fast heartbeat. Large overdoses may cause serious effects including seizures and dangerous heart rhythms (seen in animals). Contact your Regional Poison Control Center; treatment is supportive, including protecting the airway and monitoring vital signs.
What Papaverine does in the body
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Papaverine's main effect is relaxing smooth muscle, particularly when it is in spasm. It widens larger arteries, including coronary, cerebral, peripheral, and pulmonary arteries. It has minimal effects on the central nervous system, though very large doses may cause some sedation and sleepiness.
How your body processes Papaverine
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Papaverine is effective by all routes of administration. Much of it settles in fat and the liver, and about 90% is bound to proteins in the blood. It is metabolized in the liver and leaves the body in the urine in an inactive form.
How to store Papaverine
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Store at 20° to 25°C (68° to 77°F); excursions permitted to 15° to 30°C (59° to 86°F) (See USP Controlled Room Temperature). PROTECT FROM LIGHT.
Written from the FDA-approved label with AI and reviewed by our pharmacy team. How we use AI →
Supplements & herbs that interact with Papaverine
20 supplements and herbal products have documented interactions with Papaverine in the licensed clinical database we use. Most are manageable — but your pharmacist should know about everything you take, including vitamins and herbals.
- Major · 2
- Moderate · 9
- Minor · 9
Educational information from a licensed clinical database (Natural Medicines) — see our data sources & update cadence. Not medical advice: an interaction being documented does not mean it will happen to you; do not start or stop medications or supplements without professional guidance.
Papaverine: pharmacist answers to common questions
Quick, plain-English answers to the questions patients ask most about Papaverine — the kind of thing our pharmacy team would talk through with you at the counter.
What is papaverine used for?
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How is papaverine given?
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What side effects should I expect?
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Who should not get papaverine into a vein?
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Can it be used for erectile dysfunction?
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Does papaverine affect the liver?
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Is Papaverine available over the counter?
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When was Papaverine first available?
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Who makes Papaverine?
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Answers drafted from the FDA-approved label with AI and reviewed by our pharmacy team. How we use AI →
More about Papaverine on HelloPharmacist
Papaverine forms and strengths (how it comes)
Papaverine is available in 1 form. Different forms and brands can have different approved uses, doses, schedules, and directions. Follow the instructions for your exact product, and do not switch forms without guidance from your prescriber or pharmacist.
Need a version that does not list lactose, a gluten source, a dye or gelatin? Inactive ingredients differ by manufacturer: see Papaverine inactive ingredients by manufacturer.
Injection
How this form is used
- Papaverine Hydrochloride injection is used for conditions with smooth muscle spasm, including vascular spasm with heart attack, angina, and peripheral or pulmonary embolism.
- Papaverine Hydrochloride injection is also used for visceral spasm such as ureteral, biliary, or gastrointestinal colic.
- Papaverine Hydrochloride may be given into a vein or into a muscle.
- Papaverine Hydrochloride is recommended by vein when an immediate effect is wanted, injected slowly over 1 to 2 minutes.
- Papaverine Hydrochloride doses given by injection may be repeated about every 3 hours as indicated.
Papaverine on the U.S. market: products, makers and brands
How Papaverine appears in the FDA’s National Drug Code Directory — including its dosage forms, strengths, brand names, manufacturers, and FDA-listed product records. These are directory records, not sales or prescription volume.
4 companies list 4 Papaverine product records with the FDA, mostly as injection; the earliest marketing or approval year on record is 1995. Brand names on the directory include Pavacot; the rest are generics.
Also listed with the FDA, not a patient dose form: Powder (17) — bulk drug substance sold to compounders/manufacturers and multi-item kits. These aren’t counted in the dose-form total above.
Share of FDA-listed product records by manufacturer — FDA National Drug Code Directory. Record counts are not sales or prescription volume.
How widely Papaverine is used (Medicaid data)
A general measure of how commonly Papaverine is prescribed, based on Medicaid — one of the largest public drug programs. The figure below is prescriptions filled in Q1–Q4 2025, summed across every form and brand of the drug.
Think of this as a proxy for how widely Papaverine is used, drawn from freely available public data. Medicaid is just one program — these numbers don’t include Medicare, other government coverage, or commercial and cash-pay prescriptions, so real-world use is higher than what’s shown here.
How commonly is Papaverine prescribed? Of the 1,601 medications we measure, Papaverine ranks #1,584 by Medicaid prescriptions — more than 1% of them.
Utilization by Papaverine product
Pick a product to see its own Medicaid numbers. Each chip is one clinical product — a specific strength & dosage form as defined by RxNorm — with brand-name and generic versions combined.
2 ML papaverine hydrochloride 30 MG/ML Injection
Summed across the 1 of 10 listed NDC products with Medicaid activity — every brand and generic of this exact strength & form. RxNorm 1789947
Shares are of the Medicaid prescriptions shown here. Product grouping follows RxNorm (the National Library of Medicine’s drug terminology), so “one product” means one strength & dosage form regardless of manufacturer. Dollar figures are gross Medicaid reimbursement before mandatory rebates — rebates (often large, especially for brand-name drugs) are confidential, so actual net cost to Medicaid is lower than shown.
Source: Medicaid State Drug Utilization Data (CMS), aggregated by generic ingredient — summed across every NDC (all brands, strengths, salt forms and dosage forms) of Papaverine, and across all states and both fee-for-service and managed-care claims. A general popularity signal; it excludes Medicare, commercial insurance and cash prescriptions, so it is not total U.S. use. Based on the 1 of 10 listed Papaverine NDCs with Medicaid activity.
Compare Papaverine products
A representative set of FDA-listed product records for Papaverine — across manufacturers, strengths, and dosage forms, grouped by form with each product’s manufacturer and how the FDA approved it. The same medicine may be made and packaged by different companies, so a single drug can have many directory entries. (It’s also why a refill can look different — a new shape, color, or box — even though it contains the same medication.)
| Strength | Route | Manufacturer / Labeler | Category ⓘ | Details |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 💊Injection | ||||
| 30 mg/mL | Intravenous | American Regent, Inc. | UNAPPROVED DRUG OTHER | View NDC → |
| 30 mg/mL | Intramuscular, Intravenous, Parenteral | BPI Labs LLC | UNAPPROVED DRUG OTHER | View NDC → |
| 30 mg/mL | Intramuscular, Intravenous | Nexus Pharmaceuticals, LLC | UNAPPROVED DRUG OTHER | View NDC → |
| 30 mg/mL | Intravenous | Oryza Pharmaceuticals Inc. | UNAPPROVED DRUG OTHER | View NDC → |
Showing 4 of 4 products — FDA National Drug Code Directory. See every product, package size and price: browse all 4 Papaverine NDCs →
Papaverine side effects reported to the FDA (FAERS)
After a medicine reaches the market, patients, doctors and drugmakers can send the FDA reports of problems they think may be linked to it. Here’s what’s been reported for Papaverine — a signal of what to watch for, not proof the drug caused it.
Source: openFDA, from the FDA Adverse Event Reporting System (FAERS). These are voluntary reports — they don’t prove the drug caused the effect, and counts reflect how often something was reported, not how often it actually happens. Reports also often name the very problem the medicine is taken for — a common reason to file one is that the drug didn’t help — so for a pain reliever you may see “pain” high on the list; that points to why the report was filed, not to the drug causing the symptom. This counts every report that lists Papaverine in any role, so the total runs higher than the FDA’s official dashboard, which counts only cases where the drug is the suspect. For the authoritative figures, see the FDA FAERS Public Dashboard. Always talk to your pharmacist or doctor.
Papaverine FDA approval history
How Papaverine went from FDA review to the pharmacy shelf — the key milestones in its regulatory journey.
Source: Drugs@FDA.
Papaverine recall history
A recall is when a specific batch of a medicine is pulled from the market — usually a manufacturing issue, not a problem with the drug itself. Class I is most serious, Class III least.
The FDA’s enforcement reports list 2 Papaverine recalls since July 2021. One of them is still ongoing and is listed first. A recall names specific lots from one company, so check the lot number on your own bottle rather than assuming every product is affected; your pharmacist can check whether your supply came from an affected lot.
- Papaverine HCl Injection, USP, 60 mg/2 mL (30 mg/mL), packaged in a) 2mL Single-Dose Vial (NDC 0517-4002-01), and b) 25x2mL Single-Dose Vials (NDC 0517-4002-25), Rx Only, AMERICAN REGENT, INC., SHIRL… Lots: Lot #: 25202, Exp. Date: 11/30/2026. FDA record D-0800-2026 →
- PAPAVERINE HYDROCHLORIDE Injection, USP, 60 mg/2mL (30 mg/mL), packaged as a) 25 x 2mL Single Use Vials per box (NDC 72516-024-25) and b) 10 x 2mL Single Use Vials per box (NDC 72516-024-10); Manufac… Lots: Lot #: a) 20VPHI037, 20VPHI038, 20VPHI039, Exp 12/31/2022; 21VPHI021, 21VPHI022, 21VPHI023, Exp 6/30/2023; 21VPHI047, 21VPHI048, Exp 10/31/2023; b) 21VPHI023, Exp 6/30/2023 FDA record D-0742-2022 →
Source: FDA enforcement (recall) reports, via openFDA; our copy was last updated Sep 24, 2026.
RxNorm Concept Web — From Ingredient to Every Form and Strength
This page starts with one ingredient concept (IN). The branches below show its dose-form concepts (SCDF), then the available clinical drug and strength concepts (SCD). Combination products remain separate concepts with their own pages.
RxCUI 7895 5 dose forms · 5 strengths
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Dose form (SCDF) Extended Release Oral Capsule RxCUI 373226No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 150 MGRxCUI 312216 -
Dose form (SCDF) Injectable Solution RxCUI 108499In current FDA listingsClinical drug / strength (SCD) hydrochloride 30 MG/MLRxCUI 237210 -
Dose form (SCDF) Injection RxCUI 1789944In current FDA listingsClinical drug / strength (SCD) 2 ML papaverine hydrochloride 30 MG/MLRxCUI 1789947 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Capsule RxCUI 375897No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 150 MGRxCUI 312215 -
Dose form (SCDF) Oral Tablet RxCUI 373227No current FDA listingClinical drug / strength (SCD) 100 MGRxCUI 312214
Look up RxCUI 7895 in the RxCUI Atlas →
RxNorm is the U.S. National Library of Medicine’s normalized drug vocabulary. Its concept hierarchy can include forms that are not currently marketed; the status on each branch compares that concept with current FDA listings. RxCUIs identify vocabulary concepts, not individual packages or manufacturers.
Papaverine supply and shortage status
Whether Papaverine is in short supply in the U.S. right now, plus any shortage history the FDA has on record. A shortage usually reflects a manufacturing or demand issue — not a safety problem with the drug.
Source: openFDA, from the FDA Drug Shortages database.
Papaverine brand names
Papaverine is sold under one brand name in the FDA directory — Pavacot. A brand and its generic contain the same active ingredient; the brand name belongs to one company's product.
Who makes Papaverine: manufacturers and labelers
4 companies list Papaverine products with the FDA. By number of product records, the largest are American Regent, Inc., BPI Labs LLC, Nexus Pharmaceuticals, LLC. Labelers include manufacturers and repackagers; the product in your bottle depends on which one your pharmacy stocks.
Papaverine drug class (RxNorm)
Papaverine belongs to the Papaverine and derivatives class.
Classified by RxNorm RxClass — the U.S. National Library of Medicine's standardized drug-classification service (Established Pharmacologic Class from the FDA, the ATC drug family from the WHO, and mechanism of action). Reference only, not medical advice.
Sources for this Papaverine page
Core label, product, RxNorm, safety, and utilization data on this page come from the sources identified below. AI-written, editorial, and licensed sections are labeled separately.
How this page is built
HelloPharmacist combines public FDA and NLM records and does not author the underlying clinical facts. The plain-language sections are written with AI from the FDA-approved label text and reviewed by our pharmacy team before publication. Oryza Pharmaceuticals Inc. is the representative DailyMed label linked for verification and dates. This is general education, not medical advice: always talk to your doctor or pharmacist about your own medicines. How we build and review drug pages →