It’s been six weeks since Prince passed tragically at his home just before he was scheduled to see an addiction specialist to seek treatment. The report on his cause of death has now been released. Prince’s death has been ruled an accidental opiate overdose. While Prince was said to be addicted to Percocet, the medical examiner found that the drug which killed him was fentanyl, another far more powerful opiate.
Toxicology tests for Prince concluded that the entertainer died from an accidental overdose of the opioid fentanyl, according to a report on his death by the Midwest Medical Examiner’s Office.
Fentanyl, prescribed by doctors for cancer treatment, can be made illicitly and is blamed for a spike in overdose deaths in the United States. It’s 25 to 50 times more potent than heroin and 50 to 100 times more potent than morphine, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration.
Prince, whose full name was Prince Rogers Nelson, died April 21 at age 57, after being found unresponsive in an elevator at Paisley Park, his home and recording studio in Chanhassen, Minnesota.
The report from the medical examiner’s office, which was released on Twitter, didn’t provide many details. “How injury occurred: The decedent self-administered fentanyl,” the report said. For manner of death, a box was marked for “accident.”
The report didn’t specify how the drug was taken and if the fentanyl was prescribed or illegally made.
The music superstar weighed 112 pounds and was 63 inches tall when he died, the report said. He was wearing a black cap, shirt, pants, boxer briefs and socks and a gray undershirt, the report said. His occupation was listed as “artist” and his business as “music.”
The full autopsy and toxicology reports will not be released, the office told CNN.
At 5’3″ and 112 pounds Prince was in the normal range with a BMI of 19.8 and was not technically underweight. NBC reports that he was being “being treated for opioid withdrawal, as well as anemia and a fatigue” at the time of his death. I’ve only heard of fentanyl in passing and was not aware that it had so much potential for abuse and for overdose. Many outlets are reporting how potent it is, it’s the most powerful opiate available and is 25 to 50 times stronger than heroin, along with the fact that it’s caused thousands of accidental deaths. According to experts quoted by People Magazine, the drug was originally meant to be used for pallative, or end of life care, but is now routinely given to patients who have become habituated to other opiates and aren’t getting the same pain relief.
It’s unknown if Prince had a prescription or how he obtained the drug, but a criminal investigation is underway. This also brings attention to the street use of the drug, which can be highly deadly as users may not realize how much stronger fentanyl is than heroin. Just touching or inhaling the drug can be fatal. NBC News quotes the chief pathologist at Tufts University, Barbarajean Magnani, who says that Prince’s case is sadly all too common. “This was a man in his 50s who may have been struggling with pain and took a very potent opioid analgesic and died accidentally from an overdose. Celebrities bring it to our attention, but we see this every day.” RIP Prince.
photos credit: WENN and FameFlynet
Saw a great quote on Twitter: Prince didn’t die from opiate addiction, he died from chronic pain.
That said, this all feels icky to me. Let the man rest in peace.
I don’t get that quote. Lots of people live with chronic pain, my brother among them, but don’t risk their lives by taking dangerous drugs.
Fentanyl is a prescription drug used for serious pain. Prince showed no signs of doctor shopping the last I heard. He had one doctor prescribing and he used his real name on the prescriptions. I think he was dealing with hip pain, which can be really tough.
It’s not uncommon to become addicted to prescription painkillers. Generally it’s considered as a serious risk but the assumption is that the addiction can be dealt with once the pain is dealt with. So it’s not odd that he was consulting with an addiction specialist.
One phenomenon is the buildup of tolerance for a drug, so it takes higher and higher doses to get the same painkilling effect. This increases all the risks if the patient tries to take more than prescribed to get relief.
Size does matter in dosing, so the risk could be higher if allowance for size is not properly taken into account. I acted loopy on a normal dose of a prescription antihistamine that didn’t phase my adviser, who was three times my weight…. The doctor didn’t even think to recommend a smaller dose – I tried half a tablet on my own, and could then function. Also some people are simply more susceptible to side effects than others.
It makes tons of sense. I used to work at a mail-order prescription company processing orders, and TONS of people are legally prescribed this for pain. In fact, my own father has a box of fentanyl patches upstairs; he’s 73 but doesn’t have cancer. He doesn’t use them often, but he has acreage , gardens and animals so after a hard day of yard work sometimes he’ll use half of one for back pain. This is tragic, and acting like Prince was some kind of idiot for wanting to treat chronic pain is crazy imo. It’s scary to me, and something I may have to bug my dad about. I never realized it was so strong.
I agree. And there have been reports of Prince doctor shopping and going to numerous different pharmacies all within a 50 mile radius of his home within days of each other to obtain pills.
Unfortunately, I think this truly is a case of addiction. Of course, only he and his Higher Power know for certain –but all signs point to Yes.
Exactly. I wasn’t even aware of how much pain Prince was in until more recently. I knew he had pain, but didn’t realize how deep. The whole situation is tragic, and I hate that some people want to paint him as a drug addict.
Whatever pain, however strong, there r opiates besides fentanyl. That is such a strong drug that the pain alone wouldn’t allow him to tour,he’d be too high to leave home. Drs prescribe anything to anyone, they need to be held accountable. Some drs refuse to even give opiates. But $$$$ talks.
May he rest in peace…
Addiction is a disorder, and should be treated as such sans stigma. Particularly as addiction is the result of medical care gone wrong, as in the case of pain management protocol.
@Fee: not necessarily. I have a friend who is prescribed fentanyl for chronic back pain, and she walks and talks and leaves the house and even takes transit. Her Dr is always careful to monitor and not overprescribe, of course. But it does not turn her into a drooling zombie nor is prescribing medication to relieve actual pain a bad thing. It doesn’t help anyone to demonize those medications.
That’s a great quote. I have two people in my life that suffer daily from chronic pain. Both of them have strict prescriptions from pain management doctors for their pain killers. Sometimes they run out near the end of the month because the pain can be much worse on any given day. They struggle a lot without the medication. It’s heartbreaking to see.
I do not claim to have the answer, but more needs to be done in this field. Some people can’t even get out of bed because their pain is so bad. So medication has its place. With meds, the people I know are able to function and continue to work. They only get enough medication to take an edge off the pain, it never goes away entirely. I don’t think the Feds coming down on doctors is the solution however. There are more and more documented cases of patients being cut off by doctors who are too scared to write prescriptions. Some of these people are disabled because of this and simply can’t work. Others are turning to heroin which is much cheaper. The number of deaths from heroin overdose is steadily on the rise, and increased dramatically in the past few years. I personally don’t think this is a coincidence. It’s a byproduct of the crackdown on prescription meds.
Of course there will always be addicts that abuse these drugs, you’ll never stop that. But my heart aches for people that truly need these medications in order to live a halfway decent life. Pain management is a field that needs to expand. It needs to offer additional tools to pain patients other than just meds, as well as some sort of counseling to go along with it. You can’t determine who is an addict or abuser just by spending 5 minutes with them every other month. Like I said, I don’t have the answer, I just know there is a place for pain meds.
Unfortunately for rich, powerful people, they have too many enablers and “yes men” around them to say no or try and force the issue through intervention. People like Elvis, Michael, Whitney, Prince, they never had a chance in my opinion. When you have money and connections and are an addict, you can find anything you need.
Well said. Also “interventions” can make things worse by shaming people into hiding and alienating them from those who care for them.
So very sad. RIP with no more pain, sweet Prince😢
Beautifully said UCatwoman, exactly what I wish for him.
I wish I knew why I’m having such a hard time accepting that he died, but I’ve been really sad about it. Maybe it was how he was found, that he was intensely private or his childhood. But I’m amazed how much talent he had, his quiet philanthropy, his passion, humour and love.
I’m sad you’re gone beautiful one…RIP…you’re free of pain! Thank you for sacrificing your health for the sake of your audience! If I knew then what I know now I would have been happy watching you perform at you piano! Your music and stage presence will forever be with me!
Still just all around sad. Drugs take so many wonderful and worthwhile lives. RIP.
This subject is totally enraging me.
20 to 25 times stronger than heroin????????????????
Are you kidding me???? Are you KIDDING ME??????????
It’s on some William S Boroughs sh*t…. And it’s overwhelming many many people. What an evil evil product
It’s not evil. It was created for people in extreme pain – cancer patients, burn victims, etc. It has valuable uses within its proper context. Don’t demonize legitimate users because the drug unfortunately has recreational uses.
Late last year I was diagnosed with an auto-immune disease, which has now developed into rheumatoid arthritis. I’m in constant pain, my lower back has suffered immensely, I can barely walk more than 20 metres without giving up, and will likely have to give up the job I love any day now. I cannot take the usual pain medications for RA, as they make me ill to the point of chucking up. After trialling several, I was advised that fentanyl patches would be a good option, since they’d bypass the stomach. I’d never heard of it, so did some research. What I read frightened the daylights out of me. There is no way I’m even trying it. I can understand Prince looking for pain relief, as chronic pain adversely affects every area of your life, and I’m nowhere near as creative and productive as he was. I don’t know what could/would have helped him, as I’ve only started on that journey, but I do know that having a doctor or doctors who truly have your safety and well-being as their priority is crucial. RIP Prince.
The patch is designed to release the drug slowly and continuously into your bloodstream. It has safe medical use.
People who abuse fentanyl scrape the substance off the patch and ingest it orally or inject it (thereby ingesting a massive dose way too quickly), and there are illegal manufacturers who extract the substance from the patch and add it to a chemical mix to manufacture pills (producing pills in which the fentanyl content is variable and unpredictable, when a grain of sand-size quantity can be fatal).
What Ally8 said. There have been cases of healthcare workers stealing used patches out of the garbage to try and scrape whatever remains on the patch.
It’s a very useful drug if used properly and it’s usually only given to people with pain that’s not managed with other meds. My friends grandpa used them when he was dying of cancer. It made him able to be alert and communicative in his final months. He got some quality time with his family because of it. Before that, his pain was so intense, they’d end up just knocking him out with morphine until he passed out.
It is not evil at ALL.
I was recently hospitalised with a massive kidney stone. I have chronic pain issues unrelated to my kidneys and live with severe pain every day but the pain from the stone was unlike anything I’ve ever experienced. All I could do was lie as still as possible and moan and vomit. I had tears running down my face. The doctors tried morphine and it did nothing.
They started giving me fentanyl every hour and it was the ONLY thing that helped. Within about 5-10 minutes of receiving it the pain retreated to the point where I was capable of talking. The relief only lasted 15-20 minutes but without that drug I would have been in excruciating, constant pain for 48 hours. I am so grateful for it.
When my grandma was sent home to my dad’s house to die of cancer, he and his wife tucked her into a comfy bed, put a fentanyl patch on her so she would not be in terrible pain when she died. She died within hours of arriving at her son’s home. She wanted to be out of the hospital and with him when she went, no doubt. The hospice sent several fentanyl patches, but my grandma only used the one. The hospice sent a nurse who came to the houses, counted the patches, checked my grandma’s body to ensure that the missing one was accounted for, and left with the medication. That’s when I realized that drug had high street use value. They didn’t just let us keep the extra or take it back ourselves. A human came and GOT the patches. Either that, or that nurse was going to resell the drugs 😉
The patches are not “evil”! My grandmother died in little to no pain. What a blessing.
I’ve been a yoga teacher for nearly 15 years. Yes there are poseurs and some cult aspects. However, it’s a way to stop the pain before it starts and or to manage once it begins. I did a personal experiment to go completely med free for over 2 yrs now- now advil, no nothing. I also haven’t had a drink or drug in nearly 20 years, so yoga is my daily opiate. I believe it’s the alternative to the wave of medically induced drug addiction.
This is true it is stronger so much lower amounts make up a doseage to balance it so it’s not giving at that level.
This just breaks my heart. He may have been able to be saved if he had been found earlier, but the addiction would have still been absolute misery for him. It’s all just too much. And too tragic.
I, too, heard that Prince had been in that elevator for hours before he was finally discovered. That breaks my heart even more.
I still maintain that he wanted to die in the elevator. That way when we listen to “Let’s Go Crazy” for all of time, when we hear, “don’t let the elevator bring us down, punch a higher floor,” we will think he was psychic and he knew he was going to die in an elevator. He was that much of a genius.
RIP Prince, you will be missed.💜
Ugh so unfortunate and so unnecessary. I hope they find the dr who gave that to him. That should have been a big no!
It may not have been a doctor.
The Daily Mail ran a grim story last month about a person called “Doctor D” who claimed to be Prince’s dealer at one time. He specified that Prince only purchased Dilaudid and Fentanyl from him – in large quantities. At the time I did not believe the story; however, considering what we know now, perhaps there is some truth to that story.
If Prince had been in chronic pain for a long time, and taking pain meds so that he could continue to perform as usual, then he would have quickly built up a tolerance and a dependence. He could have been under the care of a medical doctor, receiving regular prescriptions for pain meds, but supplementing through other means if his perceived needs exceeded what the doctors were willing to prescribe (a common scenario, unfortunately). Considering his celebrity and financial means, it is highly likely that he would have easier access to such meds without needing a medical doctor.
Ultimately, I remain as brokenhearted as I was on April 21 when the world learned that this beautiful, magical creature “punched a higher floor”. The apparent fact that he suffered with chronic pain, became dependent on pain medication, and ultimately lost his life as a result, only saddens me more.
😭😭😭😭
RIP Prince.
So where did the AIDS stories come from??
It started as a blind item. People guessed it was Prince.
Not that he had AIDS—but he could have had it or any other condition, the Medical Examiner report released *only* the bare minimum of information that is public under Minnesota law. If AIDS (or cancer, or whatever) was part of his health history but not the direct cause of his death, it was not reported. Same as the fact that he could have had other medications on board, but Fentanyl was at a fatal level so that is why only Fentanyl was named in the Medical Examiner report.
One of my very best high school friends died the same way. He had been wheelchair bound after a fall. I hope that research makes a break through soon so that pain and addiction/overdoses don’t continue this way.
I’m sorry about your friend. 🙁
Legislators need to get on board and start approving the use Narcan, and stop criminalizing non-violent addicts. 41 people A DAY in the US die from opiate overdose. Big pharm and the prescribers need to take some serious responsibility as well.
Prescribers are taking responsibility. You can’t get refills with many of those drugs. I’m assuming Prince ,like many others doctor shopped or bought it illegally.
I would argue that some prescribers are. I have plenty of friends, ranging in their 30’s to their 70’s who are addicted to benzos and opiates, and their docs give them whatever they want. A 73-year old woman I care for is prescribed antidepressants and lorazepam because she’s “bored at home”, who’s doctor told her “don’t bother trying to get off them since you’re going to die sooner than later”.
ONe of the problems in New York State is that the heroin is being cut with fentanyl. For an addict, this is the good stuff. Unfortunately, it has lead to a drastic increase in overdose deaths, even with narcan being available to police and emts.
Sad. It’s all sad.
The drugs have been so regulated! Vicodin is no longer a call-in prescription. My mother, who has major chronic pain from a variety of different conditions, has to get to a doctor’s office now every month in order to get prescriptions for her pain in her hand. The doctor can’t give refills. He can’t call them in. It’s very hard on people, especially the elderly, who legitimately need those medications but cannot get them as easily as before. And I don’t know that the new law has had an effect on the illegal use of the drugs.
I’m the only one in my family who -isn’t – on prescription meds. They find my abstinence to be smug and annoying.
I will always miss him.
gods, THIS THIS THIS.
:'(
Yes! Cosign x 1000.
I just googled fentanyl and it took me 5 sec. to find out that this is a VERY powerful drug used for cancer patients, people in extreme pain after getting burned etc.
I honestly don’t get why people in general don’t do background checks on the drugs they are taking. It`s so easy to obtain this info these days!
More than likely, he knew exactly what it was. If he was seeing an addiction specialist, then it wasn’t just a case of stumbling onto the wrong medicine. I’m not doubting he had chronic pain, but I don’t think he was ignorant of what he was taking.
He did the splits in almost all of his live shows early on and was walking with a cane, almost 24/7, in later years.
He must have bee in agony.
Medical marijuana is safe but M.N. has very limited oil only policy. It’s not deadly like the opiate epidemic that usually starts with rx pills. It’s so awful how anyone can get addicted. Be careful and use natural medicine if possible. Move to a rec/ medical state or vote for it to push the drug dealing feds to the path of legalization! Could have saved Prince or anyone else a senseless death.
Here in Australia we’ve only just taken the first steps on the medical marijuana road. I’ve never even tried weed, but am so pissed off and frustrated that there is still such opposition and politicians dragging their feet on this issue. I’m not even speaking for myself; there are so many children, young people, cancer sufferers of all ages, so many people whose lives would be so much better if they had access to MM. If that’s too difficult for the powers-that-be to hurry through, just legalise weed and be bloody done with it.
I agree. I don’t want to get high but I DO want to get the benefits of its anti-nausea properties. The meds I take for my chronic pain often make me nauseous and it would be so helpful.
MM for pain management doesn’t seem to exist. I’m sorry, but I would take a derivative in my medicine cabinet, but I can’t find anything substantial. My sweet dog has cancer, and I’d love to give her an alternative to chemo, but there isn’t anything viable on why market. What is MM for then if there is nothing available with substantiated effectiveness regarding dosages, etc?
They now give fentanyl as a labor and delivery drug (epidural or bolus). Extremely powerful stuff, and clearly, extremely dangerous when used improperly. Very sad to hear it can be manufactured illegally
Now that you mention it, I think they put fentanyl in my epidural for my c-section in October. I can’t imagine how people get this stuff outside of a hospital.
A couple of nurses I know offered to get me some. I didn’t ask how. There’s no way, after what I’ve read about that poison, that I’m going anywhere near it.
I was given it during my emergency c-section in 2013. When my husband asked me yesterday what it was (that Prince had taken) I reminded him of how loopy I’d been in recovery and he goes, wait THAT is what he took?!
Sizedoesmatter, Anna and notsoanon – (not sure how to multireply haha I’m tech challenged!) yep totally knocks out the pain – well at least it did for my c section, and my friend just delivered her daughter last week without the slightest bit of discomfort while prescribed it – but dang was I loopy and said friend doesn’t even remember her delivery! My husband works in medicine and occasionally he hears about someone who got busted for swiping opioids and selling them. It does happen and it’s surprisingly easy for those people to do. Sad.
Fentanyl isn’t even available in swallowable pill form. If ingested, the GI system destroys it so it is not effective that way. It can be used sublingual by putting under tongue, in transdermal patches, even in lollipops meant for those in end of life severe pain. It can also be shot up. The ME report doesn’t specify how he administered it.
Yeah. Plus the downside to fentanyl is while it can be short acting, it also is stored in the fat – so large amounts can be stored for a long time and it can take a long time to dissipate.
This is very sad news. I know someone who has struggled with an addiction to oxy and actually died for a couple minutes from an overdose in which he thought he was taking oxy but it was actually fentanyl. Luckily his gf had already called parametics who were able to revive him. It obviously scared the sh*t out of him and made him want to get clean. I have heard in the news that there has been many cases of accidental overdose from fentanyl this past yr. In a lot of those cases users are not aware that they are consuming fentanyl. And it is such a deadly drug. Just once and you could very well die. This is putting opiate users at a greater risk of a serious overdose.
This. I heard that sometimes people are shooting fentanyl when they think the substance is heroin and OD as fentanyl is actually much more potent and therefore dangerous. Also heard that the fact Prince was found fully dressed in his elevator vs in bed or something suggests he was knocked out by what he was taking when he did not expect it. Not that he didn’t know what he was taking but the potency of how it hit him that night was unexpected assuming he had taken it before.
This can’t be what it sounds like when doves cry!
Miss u Prince!
Fentanyl overdose is a big problem where I live. People buy what they think is a less-harsh opiate and it turns out to be laced with fentanyl. Tragic.
Some of the most disturbing episodes of “Intervention” I’ve seen featured individuals addicted to Fentanyl. My heart breaks for Prince.
Fentanyl OD’s have been widely reported where I live (SF Bay Area) just recently. Dealers have been dressing up Fentanyl and selling it on the street as Norco and people have been accidentally ODing at a stunning rate because authentic Norco isn’t even a fraction as potent as Fentanyl. So tragic for all.
RIP beautiful Prince.
In Sacramento we had like 26 deaths in a few weeks from fake Norcos that were actually fentanyl. Same markings and everything! So scary, many of the deaths were extremely casual users (like they were given ONE pill from a friend and that was it). I’ve had it for post delivery pain and later during a surgical procedure to fix complications of said delivery. Very crazy, it made my blood pressure drop so quickly I started losing consciousness and had to be quickly helped back to the bed. RIP Prince, so sorry you lived with that kind of pain.
63 inches is 5’1”
12×5=60+3 = 63.. 5″3′.
If this was prescribed, is this an indicator that perhaps the things that are not being revealed in report would have been fatal and perhaps in the near future.
Perhaps he was terminal with something that didn’t play a part in his death, but death was imminent?
At any rate, it’s still so sad.
I’m in Australia and was given Fentanyl by an ambo (Paramedic) via cannula due to severe Acute Pancreatitis. It is a Morphine-wannabe type thing. I previously had Morphine during other times in the hospital for SAP and AP, and found the Fentanyl to be pretty weak, to be honest, and didn’t work as well as the Morphine. The ambo said that some ambulances are only stocking Fentanyl now, because is supposedly has less preservatives or allergic agents than Morphine. I would have PREFERRED the Morphine! After that, had only Morphine in the hospital, and Endone tablets. I think Prince must have taken a much, much, much higher dosage than normal, because Fentanyl was like taking home brand Panadol and didn’t seem to be anywhere near as strong or as efficient as Morphine.
What I’d like to know, given the week he’d had, is why someone wasn’t with him constantly. or at least checking in with him frequently? I read somewhere that he laid in the elevator for several hours. How? He was clearly ill, why wasn’t he supervised by those that care about him?
I’ve been slowly going through his music in the last weeks. Prince is a genius. I will not accept that he is dead. He will always be with us.
LE has stated that there is no RX for Prince for Fentanyl in any database.
I adore Prince and am mourning his passing .
However, this was not a drug prescribed to him.
I agree with you that Prince was great and should be mourned. But I find it super ironic that if any other person on the street died of long-time addiction problems, people wouldn’t be going through making all these excuses for him and saying how terrible it was about his chronic pain. The fact is a lot of addiction stems from chronic pain problems.
From having lived for seven years with a person highly addicted to opiod I fully get it .
Look at the date for this article in Princes local paper…
http://www.startribune.com/officials-sound-the-alarm-over-deadly-synthetic-fentanyl-in-minnesota/374352711/
So damn sad… Such a waste …
You will always be my Prince …
You sexy MFer
I have had fentanyl – once it was used to keep me in a state they called ‘twilight’ for a surgery, and it worked very well. I can’t remember if it was in a patch form or if it was injected at the time – I thought I was out the entire surgery. I have been offered the fentanyl patches for cancer pain but have not opted to accept the script. I do not take any opiates for pain at all, but Drs offered me the fentanyl script anyway. Not my primary care Dr, but specialists that are trying to help me. It’s not like I have built up a tolerance to another med, I don’t take them, I have a kidney that is not a great worker and and adding pain meds to the already ridiculous amount of medication I have to take makes my kidney so sick. I am currently using cannabis and get injections for localized pain, I do have muscle relaxer meds available and I use anti nausea medication and an anti depressant, cuz this shiz is hardcore. But I am so afraid of getting my body addicted to pain meds, I just do not need that problem! People ask me all the time for pain medication though, once they find out I have been ill. It is pretty ridiculous. So I guess if you want it on the DL, you can find it. SO SO SCARY.
I will always miss Prince. I will never forget seeing him in concert in 2004, it had been a lifelong dream of mine. $80 bucks well spent! RIP dear Prince
Big pharma strikes again. I can’t get heroin if I wanted it but I can get a whole load of stuff which is more addictive and deadly from doctor dealers. What a Great world we live in
Yup! unfortunately
This hurts my heart. Thank you Prince for your incredible legacy. You will never be forgotten. Rest in Peace.
Who the hell gave Prince fentanyl??!! Prosecute them.