Are there any medical uses for cocaine?

Cocaine is the original and still best local anesthetic.

Cocaine is also a Central Nervous System (CNS) stimulant.

For patients experiencing extremely great pain, often the analgesics are morphine or some other opiate. Opiates in high doses cause the patient to be drowsy, and makes it difficult for the patient to be alert.

Adding sufficient Cocaine to the medication regimen along with the powerful pain killers, enables the patient to be awake and alert, while also having their pain reduced or mitigated. The combination was pioneered by a 19th Century surgeon, Herbert Snow, and is known as Brompton's Mixture, or Brompton Cocktail, named for Brompton Hospital in London, where it was administered to patients in the 1920's.

Although it has fallen into disuse, and has been disregarded by most contemporary physicians treating patients experiencing high levels of severe and intense pain, the Brompton's Coctail combination of Morphine Sulfate plus Cocaine Hydrochloride is unmatched in effectively providing the patient pain relief, without them having to lose consciousness.

The most common use of such a combination has been with terminal Hospice patients and advanced Cancer patients.