The increasing availability of prescription fentanyl has provided a supply stream in which criminals can steal the drug from hospitals, pharmacies and patients’ medicine cabinets and sell it on the streets. As well, Chinese labs are making and selling cheap fentanyl, which North American drug dealers import and cut into other substances to increase their pro ts. According to Serr, one kilogram of Chinese fentanyl that costs $12,000 can be made into a million pills worth as much as $80 million.
What happens in a fentanyl overdose…
Fiction: A fentanyl overdose isn’t any different then any other overdose.
Fact: A fentanyl overdose has the same clinical symptoms as any other opioid overdose, except that the onset is often faster. The patient is often unresponsive, breathing is slow or has completely stopped. They usually will have an erratic, weak, or no pulse at all. They will lack oxygen, causing blue lips, and fingernails. They will have a dusky (grey) colored skin, and it will be very clammy to the touch. This is a respiratory emergency, they are almost completely derived of oxygen due to the brain basically shutting down.
How to treat a fentanyl overdose…
Fiction: A person who overdosed will come back on their own without medication
Fact: When a person overdoses on fentanyl, the drug Naloxone is often used. Sometimes if the patient has stopped breathing or their heart stopped CPR is also performed. If the first dose of Naloxone does not work, more doses can be administered every 3-5 minutes. A person who is overdosed on fentanyl is often much more difficult to revive then someone who overdosed on a less potent drug. Naloxone used to only need to be used once for the patient to become responsive again, it is now becoming more popular to use 2-3 doses of Naloxone to bring the patient back to consciousness. Naloxone is most commonly administered through the nasal passages, as shown below. You can also give it via intramuscular or through an IV
Are other street drugs laced with fentanyl…
Fiction: Marijuana, cocaine, and heroin can’t be laced with fentanyl.
Fact: Fentanyl has now become an additive to other street drugs without peoples knowledge. The drugs that are laced with fentanyl have street names such as Drop Dead, Flatline, and Lethal Injection. Healthcare workers started to notice a spike in overdoses and overdose deaths last year. Toxicology reports of autopsy materials began to reveal the presence of fentanyl, which is why police began to test heroin from the streets for the presence of fentanyl.
Reference:
JAIMET, K. (2017). The Fentanyl Crisis. Canadian Nurse, 113(1), 23-25.
Boddiger, D. (2006). Fentanyl-laced street drugs ‘kill hundreds’. Lancet, 368 North American Edition(9535), 569-570.