these patches are no joke for sure...the first rule from my pain doc was to make sure that if i was not applying these to my body, that the person that was doing so did not come into contact with side that has the medicine on it. he told me that a 25 patch could easly kill someone who isnt on any pain meds at all.

same rule goes for throwing out the patches. the instructions say to fold the patch in half and then flush down the toilet. if you throw into the garbage someone might come into contact with it.(young kids or dogs looking for food,if a dog licks that patch, its a dead dog)

such a true statement here....

stay away from HEAT if possible.

the problem is if you have crps then you probably sweat all the time which raises the body temp and forces more fentanyl into the body. this in turn does 2 things, 1)the patch does not last 72 hours and 2) you are getting to much meds at one time.

when i first started out on the patches, i would burn thru them in 30 hours because of the sweating so i had to put a patch on every day.

glad you are feeling better.

So your doc knew you had no opiates in your system and still gave you 25's(thats fricken scary). if it were me, i wouldnt use the 12.5's until i built up my system to handle it.

my other pain doc told me that a 25 patch is the same as going to the emergency room and getting a morphine injection. at the time, i was on 225mcg/h. so that would be 9 morphine injections per day every day.

i know i wouldnt be here without this medication so it was worth the ugliness the first 4 months i was on it. it took that long before we figured out what would work for me. my sweating made be go thru them so fast. i remember trying 300mcg/h but it made me sleepy and my heart felt it so i went down. the pain doc said you can keep going up until it effects the heart then you either level off or go down a little. i was on a dozen different meds to control pain and they caused lots of problems including CONSTIPATION and bleeding ulcers. now i use the fentanyl patches only except for breakthru pain. thats another story.

if you do decide to stick with this, make sure you change the patch on time. here is what i do. at 8pm every night i grab the patch i need and i grab a marker(sharpie ultra fine tip) and a tegaderm1626w for the 100,75,50 or a 1624w for the 25 and i suppose the 12.5( i dont use the 12.5). i open the tegaderm and lay flat, then i open the fent patch and put the date on it, then i lay it on the tegaderm, then i grab the flonase and mist the arm(shave the arm the night before), then put it on the arm.

the tegaderm seals the patch in so you dont have to worry about it in the shower. next i write what dose i just put on me on the calender next to my bed so i always know. trust me on this, if you are on a high enough amount you cannot remember if you put it on yesterday or the day before.

fent-any-l is the way i remember to spell it. i cant spell anything else, but i did learn this word. LOL


change the patch on TIME, you are suppose to change every 72 hours. at 80 hours or so you will get the worst headache and stomach ache from withdrawel.

Good luck Dennis....