what causes me to get a fever when i IV heroin at times.

[Call Me"PRIEST"]

i have a question that i hope someone can help me with. from time to time i get a high grade fever of 100+ degrees after injecting heroin. it doesn't happen everytime and it doesn't happen very often. at first i attributed this to the dope itself or the cut in the dope.
basically i don't have the most sterile setup there is but i try to be as clean as possible. i can't use a new rig everytime so i clean out and re-use my works. i use the same spoon everytime and keep everything together in a kit. when it happens it seems to last as long as i have that particular bundle of bags. that's what leads me to believe that it's the dope. but sometimes i notice that if i am having trouble with a certain injection site and it becomes inflamed so i was thinking it has something to do with an injection site. and there are other times that i even have to re-use cotton filters. if i am running low on filters i'll place them back in my kit to re-use later that day. so i basically use the same setup everytime. if there was a problem with my works then i would get a fever everytime i shot up.

so it could come down to a few things. one, the dope or what it's cut with. second, it could be a sterility problem. or it could be that an injection site becomes a little infected and causes a fever to fight the infection.

also, i've heard of the term "cotton fever" and wondered what that refers to.

 

[mymindisgoo]

i'm pretty sure what your referring to IS cotton fever. at least what i read on wiki and from google it sounds like it. apparently it's from the cotton, which is why yu should use a micron filter or something...

 

[Call Me"PRIEST"]

i'm pretty sure what your referring to IS cotton fever. at least what i read on wiki and from google it sounds like it. apparently it's from the cotton, which is why yu should use a micron filter or something...

but i use the same type of cotton every time. they are actually cotton makeup remover pads. i just tear a piece off and roll it tight.
since i use the same type of filter every time then i would get a fever everytime i used it but that's not the case.

i'm thinking that i might have more to do with an infected injection site...maybe even a partial miss could cause a fever.

 

[ronnyk]

if it happens w/ the whole bundle it might be something in the cut like you said, maybe try benadryl? I've seen a post where someone had hives from iv'ing and that's what someone suggested. I use cotton from cotton swabs usually but I've never experienced cotton fever yet so I'm not sure if I'm of any help.

 

[fryingsquirrel]

You are letting bacteria grow when you reuse filters. Then you inject a shiload of bacteria and get sick. I had it happen once. Alot more cafreful to use clean gear since.

 

[Call Me"PRIEST"]

You are letting bacteria grow when you reuse filters. Then you inject a shiload of bacteria and get sick. I had it happen once. Alot more cafreful to use clean gear since.

thats what i'm thinking. thanks for the advice.....i'm going to be better with cleaning.

 

[JamtasticX]

"cotton fever" has to do with re-used cottons, rarely new ones.

The inflamation of injection sites is usually related to histamine reactions, and wouldn't be from the same things that are causing a fever.

If this is happening a lot you def need to change something so it stops from happening. I would try to change cottons every time, use new spikes or clean them before each use, and use a clean spoon and fresh water

 

[Call Me"PRIEST"]

"cotton fever" has to do with re-used cottons, rarely new ones.

The inflamation of injection sites is usually related to histamine reactions, and wouldn't be from the same things that are causing a fever.

If this is happening a lot you def need to change something so it stops from happening. I would try to change cottons every time, use new spikes or clean them before each use, and use a clean spoon and fresh water

so i still had some bags left over from the bundle yesterday...the same batch that i got a fever from after using. this morning i made sure to wipe the point down with alcohol swab and clean the spoon and use fresh water and filters. it's been over an hour and no fever. so it must be related to my hygene when shooting.

what's interesting is that when i was a real bad addict i used to save the cotton filters, when i ran out of dope i would put 10-15 cottons in a spoon, draw water in the needle and soak the used cottons. you would be surprised how high you can get from using used cottons. and every time i did this i didn't get a fever.
my mistake this time was that since i only had a few cotton filters left, i put the used ones in the end of a plastic dope bag so they didn't get the inside of my kit wet. this was incredibly stupid because the wet cottons inside an airless plastic bag must have bred so much bacteria i'm lucky i only got a fever.

eventhough i think i've traced the cause of my fever back to my sterility, or lack of, i've still had dope where minutes after shooting i would get sick. hands trembling, throwing up and fever. when it first happend i thought it was from the crack i was smoking so i shot up more bad dope.