- If you are struggling with opioid use disorder (OUD)
- If you know someone who is struggling with opioid use disorder
- People taking high-dose opioid medications (greater or equal to 50 morphine mg equivalents per day)
- people who use opioids and benzodiazepines together
- People who use illicit opioids like heroin
Let others know you are carrying naloxone in case you experience an opioid overdose.
Symptoms include:
- Pale or discolored ginernails, lips, or skin
- Pupils extremely small
- Breathing slow or absent
- Cannot be aroused or falling asleep
- Limp body
- Choking or coughing, gurgling, snoring sound
If you are not sure if it is an overdose, treat it like one.
- Call 911 and give naloxone if you have it.
- Keep the person awake and breathing.
- Give breaths: 1 every 5 seconds
- Give breaths: 1 every 5 seconds
- Lay them on their side to prevent choking.
- Stay with them until responders arrive.
- CDC "Understanding Naloxone." Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, n.d., www.cdc.gov/stopoverdose/naloxone/index.html.
- Narcan "Home." Narcan, n.d., www.narcan.com/.
- SAMHSA (2018) "Opioid Overdose Prevention Toolkit." Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration, 2018, store.samhsa.gov/sites/default/files/d7/priv/sma18-4742.pdf.
- CDPH "Naloxone Prescription Project." California Department of Public Health, n.d., www.cdph.ca.gov/Programs/CCDPHP/sapb/Pages/Naloxone.aspx#tag8.
Naloxone Information
Naloxone is an FDA approaved medication designed to reverse an opioid overdose including heroin, fentanyl, oxycodone, morphine, codeine, Naloxone is safe, works almost immediately, and has no addictive side effects. Additionally naloxone has no effect if opioids are not in a person's system.