Can Fentanyl Be Absorbed Through The Skin

Can Touching Fentanyl Actually Kill You?

A bag of confiscated fentanyl (Epitome credit: Shutterstock)

In April, the TV news program "lx Minutes" aired a report nigh fentanyl, a constructed opioid much more potent than heroin that's been implicated in thousands of overdose deaths in the United States. During i segment, Justin Herdman, a U.Due south. Attorney in Cleveland, wore gloves equally he showed journalist Scott Pelley seized bags of fentanyl and carfentanyl (likewise spelled carfentanil), an even stronger counterpart of the drug, in their pulverization form.

"Then if y'all touch this stuff, it could kill you?" Pelley asked. Herdman replied, yes.

"At that place's a reason we take a medic standing by, Scott, and that'due south because an overdose is — unfortunately information technology's something that nosotros take to be prepared for, fifty-fifty dealing with information technology in an testify bag," Herdman said. [How Does Anesthesia Work?]

Fentanyl is highly potent, but to experts in the medical community, the segment was a misguided merits virtually the danger of simply being in the same room the drug.

Dr. Ryan Marino, a toxicology fellow who specializes in emergency medicine at the University of Pittsburgh Schoolhouse of Medicine, recently started using the hashtag #WTFentanyl to call out such news stories that promote fentanyl myths.

"I only promise that people can utilise a little more than critical thinking," Marino told Live Science.

Despite occasional news stories most police officers and other first responders experiencing ill effects or needing Narcan, an opioid antidote, after exposure to fentanyl, Marino said he doesn't know of any verified medical cases of a first responder testing positive for fentanyl through mere peel contact or being in the vicinity of the drug. And overdosing in such a scenario seems highly unlikely based on what researchers know virtually fentanyl and other opioids, he said.

In its guide for emergency responders, the American College of Medical Toxicology (ACMT) and American Academy of Clinical Toxicology (AACT) say that for opioid toxicity to occur, "the drug must enter the blood and brain from the surroundings." For this to happen, the drug would need to be absorbed past a mucous membrane (such equally the nasal passages), inhaled, ingested or delivered past a syringe. Fentanyl tin also enter a person's system therapeutically through dermal patches, but information technology takes several hours to absorb.

"[B]ased on our current understanding of the absorption of fentanyl and its analogs, it is very unlikely that pocket-sized, unintentional skin exposures to tablets or powder would cause meaning opioid toxicity, and if toxicity were to occur, it would not develop rapidly, allowing time for removal," the guide says.

Fentanyl too isn't volatile, meaning information technology doesn't readily vaporize or become into the air if undisturbed. In an extreme circumstance in 2002, when Russian government used an aerosol suspected to contain carfentanyl and remifentanil — a short-acting synthetic opioid — to subdue hostage-takers of a Moscow theater; more than 100 people were killed due to exposure to this gas. All the same, the AACT/AACT guide besides notes, an "optimized airborne dispersal device is unlikely to be encountered in a local consequence."

In a December 2018 article in the health news publication STAT, medical toxicologists Drs. Lewis Nelson and Jeanmarie Perrone, noted that immediately post-obit that 2002 incident, rescuers wearing limited or no protective equipment carried the victims from the theater, but weren't affected by the opiods. "Passive toxicity makes fifty-fifty less sense in conventional drug-utilize settings where other individuals are present and unaffected," Nelson and Perrone wrote.

Marino said he thinks myths well-nigh fentanyl risk are harmful in iii ways. Start, misguided fear over the drug may further stigmatize drug users, and foreclose people who overdose from being resuscitated or getting the care they demand. There is a genuine opioid crisis, with rise deaths among drug users being attributed to fentanyl; overdose is a fourth dimension-sensitive condition, and delaying treatment can be fatal.

2nd, starting time responders who start feeling ill at the scene of an overdose or a drug call might not be getting appropriate intendance and back up. "I don't desire to say that the symptoms that they're having aren't real," Marino said, but often "the symptoms do non lucifer up" with overdose and it'due south possible that they're instead experiencing "nocebo" effects (the negative counterpart of the placebo effect) or panic attacks. (The symptoms of opioid toxicity are slowed breathing, decreased consciousness and very small pupils.)

Third, myths near illicit fentanyl might create unnecessary fear virtually the legitimate uses of the drug. Fentanyl is unremarkably administered in hospitals to alleviate extreme pain for people with broken basic, for example, Marino said. The drug is handled oft past pharmacists, surgeons, nurses and anesthesiologists without the negative, passive side-effects that are being reported in these news stories.

In a guide that Marino fabricated for offset responders, he wrote that proper precautions, such as wearing gloves and washing any pare exposed to fentanyl with water (not with alcohol-based hand sanitizers, which could increase absorption) can help to protect them from exposure to the drug. If desired, wearing a N95 mask in situations where there is extreme air movement tin too reduce the risk of exposure, he said.

Editor'due south Annotation: This article was updated to include information about fentanyl transdermal patches.

How Practise Antibiotics Work?
Does Coca-Cola Incorporate Cocaine?
What Is MRSA?

Originally published on Alive Science.

Megan has been writing for Alive Science and Infinite.com since 2012. Her interests range from archeology to space exploration, and she has a bachelor's caste in English and art history from New York Academy. Megan spent ii years as a reporter on the national desk at NewsCore. She has watched dinosaur auctions, witnessed rocket launches, licked ancient pottery sherds in Republic of cyprus and flown in zero gravity. Follow her on Twitter and Google+.