How does Tylenol relieve pain without making me drowsy?
Opiate pain killers or pain killers that act on opioid receptors have a different mechanism of action than NSAIDs. They tend to act as receptor agonists which exert their effect on the CNS (oxycodone as an example). Opioid receptors are associated with analgesia, CNS depression, sedation, etc. Tylenol on the other hand is thought to exert its effect by downmodulating cyclooxygenase, and therefore inhibiting the production of prostaglandins like H2, which is a precursor to lots of pro-inflammatory compounds.