coming down off of fentanyl 1200mcg - Addiction & Recovery Message Board

wnagbadan108 · 07-08-2004, 03:38 PM

my piece of **** pain management doctor has prescribed me fentanyl lollipops for the past 4 months or so.

I have many chronic pain issues you see. All related to my Army service:
Gunshot wounds to both legs, skull fracture residuals from getting hit by a drunk driver off post, and a messed up arm and back from a helicopter crash back in 78.

He has me on 60mg oxycontin a day also.

well, I recently had a bad stomach virus that had me at the local ER at 3a.m. and 2 a.m. over 3 days.

I wound up and did more than my alotted 3x a day for 1200mcg fentanyls during this time.

probably doing 4x a day for managing the pain from the illness; the explosive vomiting, and the explosive diarrhea too.

well, comes time for me to get a refill, and he has one made out for 5 days hence!

Gee thanks MoFo for letting me know about the withdrawls from fentanyl
(N!!!O!!!T!!!)

well, I count my lucky stars that my wife has 2 spare duragesic patches for me to go down on for the next 6 days, and that should let me down easy enough.

I hope!

They are the 25mcg patches, and I was used to doing 1200mcg.

This sucks! I am glad I have enough ativan to let me down easier though.

Has anyone else gone thru fentanyl withdrawls? anyone else have a **** doctor like I have? is there a lawyer in the house?

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thanks!

Rickie M

formygirls3 · 07-08-2004, 08:21 PM

Im sorry for you troubles, and haven't much advise but i would like to tell you the transdermal patch releases 25 mcg and hr, so over an 24 hr period it is like 600 mcg or so, and while you may feel it a bit, it should really help. Also, I would have thought that your oxy would keep your withdraws down some

, but there again, i have limited experience with fentnyl, except for my mom, and a couple of patches that i experimented with, best of luck, keep us posted.
Teresa

Banker · 07-09-2004, 09:40 AM

Yes, I can relate entirely. I won't go into details but my addictionologist intentially got me addicted to those patches so that i would then switch to Suboxone... I was already addicted to lortab and had taken a couple of methadones for the two days prior to seeing him. Because of how you have to start Sub (you have to be in early withdrawals with NO opiates in your system) he couldn't give me Sub until I had been off of meth for at least two to three days.... so for some unknown reason to me, he put me on 75 mcg and brought me down to 25 by the end of three weeks... withdrawing from those was horrible... I was scared to take Sub so I just got more methadone for a two week period and that saved my life. Then I tried to quit completely and relapsed AGAIN so I finally started Sub about a month later. Your doc is an idiot --- fentanyl is stronger than morphine... It's BAD STUFF!!! And yes, those patches should help along w/your oxys but please be careful and don't take too much. Also, mixing benzos with opiates can be deadly in high doses so be careful with that too. I'm sorry about the pain you are having and that you are in this situation!

mouse62 · 07-09-2004, 09:49 AM

I hate to be a downer here but I must warn you, so that you don't completely lose your fentanyl prescription -- if you went from 3 to 4 patches a day without dr.s permission (if dr. had given you permission, then your scrip should have been adjusted to cover any gaps), then not only is the dr. completely in his/her rights to make you wait 5 days for more patches, but he/she could legitimately cut you off cold from any more patches, by claiming you abused it by taking more than prescribed. So if I were you I would not go in to the dr. and tell him off & in doing so let it slip out that you ran out of patches 'cause you bumped up your dosage without dr.s permission.

Believe me, I don't agree with how it is, if some days are really painful we should have the freedom to take extra and then have script adjusted by doctor. But the law is against us.