We specialize in providing personalized, tiered treatment programs for individuals struggling with drug addiction and alcoholism. Our compassionate team is dedicated to helping you overcome addiction, offering a supportive and understanding environment every step of the way. With a commitment to long-term recovery, we tailor our services to meet your unique needs and ensure you receive the best care possible. Traditional approaches to opioid addiction may require modification for fentanyl users due to the drug’s unique characteristics. Medical detox becomes particularly crucial given fentanyl’s potency and the severe withdrawal symptoms that typically follow cessation of use.
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You can get it at many pharmacies without a prescription, and many communities offer free training on how to use it. Helping someone with opioid addiction starts with understanding that addiction is a medical condition, not a choice. People need medical help to get better, just fentanyl fold like someone with a disease. Learning about addiction and how it affects the brain can help you be more supportive and less judgmental. Fentanyl causes extreme muscle relaxation, particularly in the muscles that help people stand up straight.
- As a prescription, fentanyl is available under the brand name Actiq, which is a throat lozenge, or Duragesic, a patch placed on the skin.
- OUDs are chronic but treatable medical conditions that involve changes in our brains, which makes stopping very difficult without support.
- Anyone witnessing the fentanyl fold should treat it as an urgent medical emergency—call 911 immediately and be prepared to provide lifesaving assistance until professionals arrive.
- Your doctor or pharmacist will show you and your family members how to use the medication.
- Effective medications that address cravings and withdrawal symptoms, as well as behavioral treatments, can help people with OUDs.
Are People Aware When They’re In The Fentanyl Fold?
Many people worry that calling emergency services for someone taking an illegal drug will get them in trouble, but this is not true. Many states have laws that protect not only the person who calls for help, but also the person overdosing from legal trouble. Fentanyl acts like many other opioids such as morphine and heroin. This overdose rate has continued to rise in part because fentanyl is often mixed into or sold as other drugs. Because fentanyl is so strong, it takes only a small dose of the drug to cause death. “It’s a degree of loss of consciousness and a degree of lost muscular control,” Dr. Daniel Ciccarone, a UCSF professor of addiction medicine, told ABC7 San Francisco.
What is fentanyl’s role in the overdose and addiction crisis?
That year, there were 1,927 opioid overdose deaths among Arizona residents, the department reported. The state saw a slight dip in opioid overdose deaths between 2021 and 2022, but it followed a sharp rise from 2017 to 2021, the Arizona Department of Health Services found in its most recent study from 2022. Valley Spring Recovery Center offers comprehensive addiction and mental health treatment services.

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Misuse of fentanyl includes taking it orally, smoking it, snorting it, or injecting it. When someone with an opioid use disorder misuses fentanyl, it is usually illegally manufactured fentanyl rather than a prescription product. For example, the person may obtain it as powders or pills or add it to containers such as eyedroppers or nasal sprays. Street names for fentanyl include Apache, China Girl, Goodfellas, Great Bear, and Tango & Cash. The Stop Overdose website educates drug users on fentanyl, naloxone, polysubstance use, marijuana addiction and dealing with stigma. Because the drug is less expensive than other opioids, people making it illegally commonly mix it into drugs such as heroin, cocaine, or methamphetamines.

- It works by changing the way the brain and nervous system respond to pain.
- Cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT) and other evidence-based therapies help individuals understand the root causes of their addiction, develop coping strategies, and address any co-occurring mental health issues.
- Although research is still ongoing, studies suggest that the fentanyl fold is primarily a neuromuscular side effect of potent synthetic opioids.
- If you see someone in the fentanyl fold, check if they’re responsive and breathing normally.
- Some observers note that this spectacle—often witnessed on the streets or on public transit—looks like a scene from a dystopian world.
- In San Francisco, for example, over 800 people died from overdoses in 2023 alone.
The FDA has approved these antidote medications for emergency treatment of patients with known https://isudicolsas.com/stages-of-alcoholism-pre-early-and-end-signs/ or suspected opioid overdose experiencing respiratory and/or central nervous system (CNS) depression. Common routes of naloxone administration include IV, IM, IN, or subcutaneous (SC). Researchers have recently posed a caveat regarding the intranasal route for naloxone administration.