By Natasha Randeniya
Assistant News Editor
On Oct. 4 at 7 p.m, experts from Torrance Memorial. Medical Center hosted “Facts of Fentanyl,” a talk on fentanyl at the Manhattan Beach Community Church.
Fentanyl is a manufactured and synthetic opioid that changes brain function and physiology. It can cause pain relief, euphoria, and addiction. Unlike other drugs, fentanyl is easy to replicate and is lethal in small amounts, which is why it is important that everyone is educated on it, according to Dr. Gretchen S. Lent.
“As you are experiencing new things, temptations and new risks, being educated on fentanyl will allow you to share information with others,” said Lent. “This will allow [others] to become educated as well.”
The panelists that spoke at this event included Lent, pharmacy clinical supervisor Felix Pham, assistant director of pharmacy Tammy Ginder and substance use navigator Carol Dunne. Each took turns giving insight on how to stay safe from fentanyl.
“Fentanyl has a highly addictive potential that keeps customers coming back for more, and the immeasurable quantities make it attractive to traffic,” said Pham. “The combination [of] stimulants are thought to hide the effects of Fentanyl.”
The discussion began with Pham, who shared the statistics of opioid overdose deaths and the dangers that are hidden within fentanyl. According to Pham, from the year 1999 to 2023, overdoses on opioids have significantly increased in number.
“I have kids, and I see a world of hurt that I can see them going straight into,” said Pham. “I know this fentanyl use can stop if we are all familiar with knowledge of how dangerous fentanyl is and talk to our kids because if we get them to stop, dealers will have no one to sell to.”
The teenage brain has an underdeveloped prefrontal cortex, Lent explained, which causes impulsive decision making. This can cause teenagers to not think before they act, which is why teenagers are the primary target of fentanyl deaths, according to Lent.
“Statistics show that most teenagers are going to experiment with illegal drugs and that 50 percent of teenagers try marijuana, which can be laced with fentanyl when not knowing where it is coming from,” said Lent. “Any street drug that you come across you have to realize that it may have fentanyl in it.”
Furthermore, Lent shared how there are two kinds of fentanyl: one that can kill and one that is used by professionals safely. In hospitals, fentanyl is used every day by doctors to help ease the pain of patients, according to Lent. The difference between the two types of fentanyl is that one is made by professionals in a lab and the other is made in the streets to be sold as an abusive drug, according to Lent.
“Fentanyl is very easy to make, so there is lots of it– it’s cheap to make, synthetic so it’s made year round, tasteless and odorless, [so] it’s hard to detect, and potent,” said Lent. “Fentanyl is local and very addictive, which means people, once they get it, will try it, like it and will destroy not only their lives but their families as well to keep getting more.”
According to Lent, opioids affect the respiratory part of the brain, which can cause breathing to stop if one takes too much of the opioid. However, according to Ginder, there is now a way that anyone can help reverse an overdose in just a few minutes with the nasal spray Narcan. Narcan is important for anyone to keep in hand in case of an opioid emergency.
“Each Narcan box comes with two nasal sprays, but Narcan is only a short form of acting, and people will still need to get to a provider,” said Ginder. “Sometimes it is necessary to give the second dose in the nostril opposite of the first side after two minutes to see if the first dose had its effect.”
The last panelist, Dunne, explained that someone experimenting with opioids shouldn’t be alone and instead get the necessary help before turning to drugs. When people are going through pain or trauma, they will turn to drugs instead of getting treatment, which can lead to death from addiction. There is now an app called “Brave” that connects people who use drugs alone with anonymous remote supervision free of judgment, according to Dunne.
“About 50 percent of the patients I have seen since 2010 were prescribed opioid pain medication by their doctors for various visible traumas,” said Dunne. “Once taken off the pain medication, the patients turned to drug dealers for elicit medications because they couldn’t get them prescribed or else they would feel like they were dying.”
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