Opioids Fentanyl patch question

[FunctionalJnkieGrl]

Let's say I acquired some 75mcg fentanyl patches from 2011, 2012, and 2020. Would the older ones be useless now even if they haven't been opened?

 

[Skorpio]

Should be stable for quite a while. I'd expect them to be as strong as the label says.

Do be careful, if you wear them and get too high, you will still keep getting dosed after taking them off, as the fentanyl accumulates in your subcutaneous fat before hitting your blood.

 

[paranoid android]

If they where not say left in your bathroom medicine cabinet i think they should be fine.

 

[negrogesic]

They are still good. I think i recall you saying your oxy doses were small (like 10mg), so becareful. Not sure if the new patches can be cut up, but if so, you might consider splitting them up before using.

When I was in high school my friend's dad died from cancer, so I wound up with his supply of morphine and 100mcg/hr fentanyl patches. With very little tolerance to opioids, I put one on while at a friends house for a weekend. After maybe 6 hours, I felt pretty much immobilized, sitting upright on a couch. I felt like if I did move I'd instantly barf everywhere, so I remained sitting there for many, many hours. Eventually made my way somehow to a bedroom where I spent the remainder of the weekend. My friends brother drew on my face with a sharpie during all of this. Despite all of that, I never took the patch off. I definitely felt dangerously high but I also kind of liked it.

In anycase, becareful.

 

[Survival0200]

Only the 12 mcg/h and 25 mcg/h patches should be prescribed to those with no opiate tolerance. So, I would be very very careful using those 75 mcg/h patches with no tolerance.

 

[LoveTractor]

I use the 50 mcg/hr patch for pain. The Mylan matrix patch on the United States market is difficult to use other than placing it on the skin. A 75 mcg/hr patch is dangerous territory for anyone without at least a decent tolerance if worn as directed. I’ve read some posts about how to abuse them, it is difficult but not impossible.

Be very careful with any gel containing patch - I’ve lost a few friends who tried to smoke a small bit of the gel and they aren’t around to tell their story.

 

[FunctionalJnkieGrl]

Unfortunately, the lady I was getting the 10mg oxy from decided she was ready to start taking less meds. The doc gave her a choice between ending her oxy script or ending her Xanax script, so she chose to quit the oxy for the sake that she needs the Xanax for frequent panic attacks. I don't blame her. Good for her, but yes, it sucks for me since I can only get 40mg oxycontin now and they're way more expensive (plus, it screwed up my tolerance despite quartering the yellow OP 40's into 10mg, given I was previously quartering 10mg and then the 5mg pills before she got cut off). I still take large doses of oxy on a monthly basis though--like 200mg. And just curious, what mg of oxy is equivalent to 75mcg of fentanyl? I use to take the 100mcg patches, so I should be fine, but I know that mcg and mg aren't the same. Also, it's been years since I've worn a patch.

 

[FunctionalJnkieGrl]

I use the 50 mcg/hr patch for pain. The Mylan matrix patch on the United States market is difficult to use other than placing it on the skin. A 75 mcg/hr patch is dangerous territory for anyone without at least a decent tolerance if worn as directed. I’ve read some posts about how to abuse them, it is difficult but not impossible.

Be very careful with any gel containing patch - I’ve lost a few friends who tried to smoke a small bit of the gel and they aren’t around to tell their story.

These are the Mylan brand. They're the flat adhesive ones, not the gel ones. Come to think of it, I rarely ever got the gel ones. I prefer the adhesive kind anyway. With a bit of tegaderm they stick way better than the gel ones.

 

[LoveTractor]

Thanks for the suggestion on getting them to adhere better, I’ve had an issue with the Mylans peeling off esp. the larger ones. I use tape but it just often gets fucked b/f 48 hours.

I didn’t realize you had experience with fent patches. So you know more than we may have guessed. I can’t get shit from used patches as a pain patient except to blow out my tolerance so I didn’t try but a few times, how did I use them - I’d rather not say having lost dear friends to the gel types.

I suspect you want to use a new patch in a way other than wearing it. Be aware that the total amount of fentanyl is just about 2x the transdermal dosage at 72 hours. I have a post here in a thread “Hydromorphone or Fentanyl for Pain” where I did the calcs. There’s about 5 milligrams in a 50-mcg patch. If you extracted all of it you’d have enough to kill a few intolerant people. And 2.2 mg from a 25-ug/hr patch is a tiny amount to work with, I don’t think chemical extraction of a single patch is worth the effort.

 

[FunctionalJnkieGrl]

Thanks for the suggestion on getting them to adhere better, I’ve had an issue with the Mylans peeling off esp. the larger ones. I use tape but it just often gets fucked b/f 48 hours.

I didn’t realize you had experience with fent patches. So you know more than we may have guessed. I can’t get shit from used patches as a pain patient except to blow out my tolerance so I didn’t try but a few times, how did I use them - I’d rather not say having lost dear friends to the gel types.

I suspect you want to use a new patch in a way other than wearing it. Be aware that the total amount of fentanyl is just about 2x the transdermal dosage at 72 hours. I have a post here in a thread “Hydromorphone or Fentanyl for Pain” where I did the calcs. There’s about 5 milligrams in a 50-mcg patch. If you extracted all of it you’d have enough to kill a few intolerant people. And 2.2 mg from a 25-ug/hr patch is a tiny amount to work with, I don’t think chemical extraction of a single patch is worth the effort.

I use to eat the 100mcg patches because it hits you harder that way. This is incredibly unsafe for those without a veteran tolerance, but the way I would do it was by cutting them into 16 pieces and eating them piece by piece throughout the day. I prefer to wear them anyway. It might not hit you all at once, but it'll last way longer that way. Eating it, given you have a tolerance, will grant you a high that will fade off before the day is over with. But wearing them, however, will give you relief for at least a few days. I'd rather have long-lasting relief than a short high, personally.

 

[crzydiamond]

The Sandoz from back then were amazing when cut into small strips and put in the gumline

I don't know why exactly, but the buccal effect was extremely different with different brands. For example, Apotec did absolutely nothing buccally

Sandoz stopped production for a time around 2012, never said why but I believe they reformulated to try to prevent the ease of that method of [ab]use.

(I used the sticker patches buccally from around 2010-2012, because back then no one knew what fentanyl was and they surely did not test for it)

With the Mylan, you can try cutting a strip and seeing if an effect. I remember they were sort of ok, nowhere near the Sandoz tho.

Being they are sticker patches, my harm reduction advice is to cut into pieces and wear only a piece at first (I don't know your tolerance so I won't say dosage advice)

Keep in mind they take a few hours to hit max saturation, the drug sort of pools in the underlayers of skin. The fent will also continue to enter bloodstream for some time due to this even after removing the patch, so don't wait to remove til you're too intoxicated

I made the mistake the first time I wore one I put half of a 75 mcg on. (I had an opiate tolerance at the time but low, maybe 60-90 mg of oxycodone or 2 bags a day. )

I was at work and started getting dizzy and overheated and nauseous and at first it didn't hit me why. I had it in about 6 -8 hours at that point.

Had to remove it.

And the reason I recommend cutting the sticker and wearing pieces is that once you remove the patch its basically useless. It doesn't work if you try to stick it back on

Just be careful. They take a while to take effect but also last a while.

 

[FunctionalJnkieGrl]

The Sandoz from back then were amazing when cut into small strips and put in the gumline

I don't know why exactly, but the buccal effect was extremely different with different brands. For example, Apotec did absolutely nothing buccally

Sandoz stopped production for a time around 2012, never said why but I believe they reformulated to try to prevent the ease of that method of [ab]use.

(I used the sticker patches buccally from around 2010-2012, because back then no one knew what fentanyl was and they surely did not test for it)

With the Mylan, you can try cutting a strip and seeing if an effect. I remember they were sort of ok, nowhere near the Sandoz tho.

Being they are sticker patches, my harm reduction advice is to cut into pieces and wear only a piece at first (I don't know your tolerance so I won't say dosage advice)

Keep in mind they take a few hours to hit max saturation, the drug sort of pools in the underlayers of skin. The fent will also continue to enter bloodstream for some time due to this even after removing the patch, so don't wait to remove til you're too intoxicated

I made the mistake the first time I wore one I put half of a 75 mcg on. (I had an opiate tolerance at the time but low, maybe 60-90 mg of oxycodone or 2 bags a day. )

I was at work and started getting dizzy and overheated and nauseous and at first it didn't hit me why. I had it in about 6 -8 hours at that point.

Had to remove it.

And the reason I recommend cutting the sticker and wearing pieces is that once you remove the patch its basically useless. It doesn't work if you try to stick it back on

Just be careful. They take a while to take effect but also last a while.

I have a 300mg morphine tolerance, a 200mg oxycodone tolerance, and a 100mcg fentanyl tolerance. I wore one of the 75mcg patches last weekend and it wasn't overwhelmingly strong. I wish I could still get the 100mcg patches, but I haven't seen any that strong in years. I won't mess with the pills though unless it's a last resort. The strength of those vary greatly, but if you gotta take them, start small. Never start with a whole pill. At least with the patches you know what you're getting.