Dallas County had more than 3,800 fatal or nonfatal opioid overdoses in 2023. That’s a 58 percent increase from 2018.

Numbers like these contributed to the recent launch of the county’s opioid overdose prevention hotline: 214-590-4000

KERA’s Sam Baker talks with Dr. Anelle Menendez. She is a poison control specialist and clinical educator at the North Texas Poison Center who will oversee the hotline.

The people on the phones are doctors and nurses. If someone is not feeling well, they can help them by calling 911 if needed, etc.

That said, the service itself will only connect them to resources that will help them begin treatment so they can prevent what could have been a possible overdose in the future.

There were more than 3,800 fatal and non-fatal overdoses last year, as I understand it – a 58% increase over 2018. What caused the increase in these numbers?

There are a lot of dirty and synthetic drugs out there. People think they are buying oxy or Xanax and really it is neither. It’s fentanyl, for example.

So are we mostly talking about the teenagers we’ve heard so much about who bought these pills?

I noticed that there is no discrimination here. There are adults in their 40s and 50s who have this problem. And then there are middle and high school kids who just start trying different drugs. And I think they buy something from their friend and it’s something synthetic. We don’t see growth anywhere in particular. It affects everyone.

You know, before we started hearing so much about fentanyl and the criminal activity surrounding it, the opioid discussion seemed to center around the use and abuse of prescription opioids.

That’s how it started, right? You would have any surgical procedure or trauma or whatever and then you end up on pain medication and that starts to create this addiction. The longer you are on those pain medications, the greater the risk of becoming addicted to them. So it started from there. It just evolved into a lot of fake pills.

As you know, doctors started moving away from the oxy code on the Percocet, the Vicodin, the things that we would normally see. Now we see a lot of people resorting to the streets and taking dirty things.

Why? Is it hard to get?

It became much harder. Doctors tightened up nationwide. They change the way they prescribe things.

What should those listening to this do or be aware of to recognize an opioid problem? And what should he do after that?

Sometimes it’s obvious. Sometimes it just took over their lives. It’s very obvious to see that everything they do revolves around this addiction and trying to get to this drug.

But other times it can be someone who disappears for a while and has his own time. And you talk to them sometimes and they’re kind of slow or sometimes you talk to them and they’re very irritable. Their personality only changes based on where they are that day with their addiction. So it depends on the person and how they exhibit those behaviors.

Sometimes it can be just symptoms like sweating, agitation, yawning. Sometimes the withdrawal symptoms we see will be very general and easy to miss.

The easiest to recognize will be the changes in their personality and the way they interact with their loved ones. And if you have questions about whether what you recognize or see in that person is actually withdrawal or signs of abuse, you can always call that hotline and the person who answers the call will help you.

RESOURCES:

A new overdose prevention hotline is launching in Dallas County

DrugFacts

The opioid crisis