Page 23 - Focus March 2018

| Addiction Medicine
At Christiana Care Health System’s Addiction Medicine Workshop: Linda Lang, M.D., Chair of Christiana Care’s Department of Psychiatry; Erin Booker, LPC, Corporate Director of Christiana Care’s Behavioral Health Service Line; Tammala Watkins, LCSW, Director of Inova Behavioral Health Access Services, Inova Health System; Maria Hadjiyane, LPC, Senior Director, Ambulatory Services, Inova Health System; April Baisden, M.D., Addiction Medicine Medical Director,
St Mary’s Medical Center, Huntington, W.Va.; Damon Hamilton, Geisinger Health System; Barb Koser, RN, Geisinger Health System; Franca Dalibor, CRS,
Geisinger Health System; Terry Horton, M.D., Chief of Addiction Medicine, Christiana Care Health System; Patrice Jordan, BSN, RN-NEBC, Geisinger Health System; Patricia Grigson, Ph.D., Penn State College of Medicine; Bettina Tweardy Riveros, Esq., Chief Health Equity Officer, Christiana Care Health System.
Beyond bedside
On the evening of Aug. 15, 2016, emergency responders in Huntington responded to 26 heroin overdoses in four hours. Though the response itself was in some sense a success, as all 26 victims survived, it was also a missed opportunity: None of the victims were offered a chance to get treated for addiction.
Robert Hansen, director of addiction services at the Marshall University Joan C. Edwards School of Medicine and Marshall Health, shared early findings from a partnership with law enforcement, emergency responders and others to reach people suffering from addiction where they live.
The quick response team, which started work in December, contacts people who have overdosed within the previous 24 to
72 hours, though finding them has not been easy. But, of the 50 percent of overdose victims who have been located over the effort’s first month, nearly half entered treatment.
Dr. Lang said Christiana Care is talking to colleagues in New Castle County to explore creating a similar program here.
The crisis continues
Meanwhile, the crisis is ever-changing. Representatives of all of the health systems reported an upswing in opioid-addicted patients who are also using other drugs.
WATCH THE VIDEO ABOUT THE ADDICTION CRISIS
Hamilton said that at Geisinger Health System in Pennsylvania, they are seeing an upswing in opioid-addicted patients who also are using amphetamines and crystal meth. Dr. Baisden said methamphetamines are on the rise in West Virginia, while Dr. Horton said that cocaine is the growing problem in Delaware.
These non-opioid drugs complicate treatment; medication to suppress opioid withdrawal does not have the same effect on other drugs. And a relapse on one drug, Dr. Horton said, usually leads to relapse on others.
Still, the creation of evidence-based treatments for addiction are giving heart to Dr. Baisden and her colleagues in West Virginia, the state hardest hit by the opioid epidemic.
“It’s a good place to be now,” she said. “A lot more positive.” 
FOCUS • MARCH 2018 21