Doctors claim the St. Joseph community is not immune to the impacts of synthetic drug abuse.
Dr. Jeremy W. Hunter is Mosaic Life Care’s Emergency Department Assistant Medical Director. Dr. Hunter said they see many people come through the ER because of synthetic drugs like bath salts and that sometimes it can be difficult to figure out what drug patients are using. Hunter said it’s hard to tell but it seems like there are more cases coming through the emergency room.
“We seemingly have more cases of excited delirium coming through the emergency department but again it’s hard to tell with a drug that we can’t test. It seems like there’s more of it yes,” Hunter said. “Usually the younger adults are the highest population for this type of drug of abuse but you can have patients in the middle age. We’ve had patients in their middle age and sometimes elderly that come in with this kind of toxidrome.”
Dr. Stephen Thornton is the medical director with the University of Kansas Poison Center. Thornton spoke Tuesday afternoon at Mosaic Life Care about “Tweeking in the 21st Century: Meth, Bath Salts and Beyond.” Thornton said the drug culture has seen a change in how drugs are distributed when it comes to synthetic compounds and the internet.
“What we’re seeing is basically a continued rise in problems being created by them which highlights the difficultly that law enforcement and the government is having in controlling these substances because of the internet,” Thornton said. “What we’re seeing really is although these substances started out in being sold in smoke shops and truck stops now they’ve been moved into being sold on the internet. It’s called the gray market.”
Thornton said people are buying synthetic drugs like bath salts online.
“You can buy these things from China or Europe and it doesn’t really matter to them if these things are illegal in the United States,” Thornton said. “What you’re kind of trying to figure out here is how do you control all the mail that’s coming in.”
He said side effects of synthetic drugs can cause hallucinations. Thornton said he hopes his presentation informs people that there are other drugs out there that may look like the side effects of methamphetamine but are actually something different. Hunter said they have seen patients come in to Mosaic Life Care on synthetic drugs with side effects that have severely altered their personalities.
“The violent nature of the excited delirium can be dangerous for both the patient and the healthcare worker in that they are irrational when you’re trying to talk to them. You can’t talk sense to them. They do not understand what’s happening,” Hunter said. “It’s truly a dangerous situation for both the patient and the healthcare worker until we can get on top of it and combat the effects of the drugs and calm them down.”
Thornton said the police departments can often encounter many people dealing with the effects of synthetic drugs.
“They are going to look in many cases like someone who’s on methamphetamine. They are going to be very agitated. Their heart rate will be real high, they’re going to be real hot and sweating. Kind of that fight or flight picture. Some of them have seizures, others may be psychotic just hallucinatory crazy,” Thornton said. “In general they’re just going to be very agitated. Unfortunately a lot of them end up interacting with the police and there can be very bad outcomes on both sides there.”
Hunter said he is unsure on how many synthetic drug abuse cases come through Mosaic Life Care because they can’t test the substances but that it happens frequently. In some cases he said the drugs can even be fatal.
“We know that they are around and we know that we have patients using them but exactly which drug it is we don’t know for sure all the time,” Hunter said. “But patients will tell us if they’re using blank, blank name so we know that they’re around.”