The United States government, through the Food and Drug Administration, has issued a safety warning concerning Duragesic skin patch, a product of pharmaceutical giant, Johnson & Johnson. It has alleged life threatening effects if a physician prescribes the drug for uses that are not appropriate.

The warning came following reports that Duragesic has dangerous effects to end users and even causes deaths "if wrongly prescribed by doctors and incorrectly used by patients."

"It's a unique problem with patches because of... the way that the drug is delivered to the body and the way it's metabolized. It's complicated by the patch formulation," said Dr. Bob Rappaport, head of the FDA division that oversees painkillers, according to a report by Xinhua News.

Introduced to the market in 1990, the Duragesic painkiller patch has been widely prescribed for patients with cancer or suffering from severe pain.

However, some doctors these days prescribed the patch as pain reliever for people who have a headache or who underwent surgery.

The patch apparently contains fentanyl, which according to a study published by a medical journal, is 100 times more powerful than morphine.

For the period 1998-2005, more than 3,500 accidental deaths were linked to inappropriate use of the painkiller patch had been reported to the FDA.