Alliance Launches Opioid Action Website

 
 
www.allianceforaction.org
www.allianceforaction.org
DURHAM, N.C. - March 5, 2018 - PRLog -- Alliance Behavioral Healthcare has launched the Alliance For Action on Opioids website (www.allianceforaction.org), a resource to help individuals, family members, and professionals take small but important steps in their lives and work to help stem the tide of the opioid epidemic.

Alliance for Action is targeted to individuals and families as well as health care providers, including pharmacists, and focuses on actions people can take against the opioid epidemic at home, or at work in the case of health care professionals.

The website highlights steps that may prevent opioid misuse and overdose deaths, such as locking up prescription drugs and properly disposing of leftover medications, learning how to prevent overdose deaths with naloxone, and recognizing the red flags of opioid misuse and addiction. It also presents resources to help people learn about smart pain management, recovery and treatment options.

For pharmacists and other health care providers Alliance For Action also advises learning to conduct "SBIRT" or "Screening, Brief Intervention And Referral To Treatment," an early intervention approach to help people with, or at risk of developing, substance use disorders before they need specialized treatment. The website also provides links to opioid-related continuing education and encourages professionals to stay current on prevention, screening and treatment knowledge and learn how to advise patients about naloxone and smart pain management.

"We want pharmacists and providers to understand opioid addiction as a chronic, preventable and treatable disease, and to increase awareness of the risk of opioids and possible drug interactions," said Alliance Clinical Pharmacist Vera Reinstein. "We also want them to recognize the value of offering naloxone to people identified as high-risk for opioid overdose."

Opioid overdoses claim nearly four North Carolinians every day and overdose deaths have increased by nearly 400 percent over the past 16 years, according to the NC Department of Justice. The US Centers for Disease Control reports that on average, 115 Americans die from opioid overdoses every day.

Alliance is the managed care organization for publicly funded behavioral healthcare services for the people of Durham, Wake, Cumberland and Johnston counties. Alliance works with a network of almost 2,200 private providers to serve the needs of 471,000 Medicaid-eligible and uninsured individuals within a total population of 1.8 million.

In North Carolina, Alliance is at the forefront of efforts to help stem the tide. When data analytics, utilization management and peer case reviews identified a pattern of risky prescribing of benzodiazepines and opioids, Alliance staff worked with providers to design and implement a set of tiered responses that aligns closely with the state's plan to reduce prescription drug misuse.

Alliance also offers ongoing technical assistance for members of its provider network and provides education on appropriate best practice prescribing guidelines and how to assess and effectively treat opioid use disorders.

In addition, Alliance invested $100,000 to supply naloxone free of charge to community providers as well as consumers with known addictions and their families, along with education on how to use it. Alliance includes instruction in the use of naloxone in its Crisis Intervention Team training for law enforcement officers and other first responders and supplied naloxone to the Wake County Sheriff's Office and the TASC program in Cumberland County.

https://allianceforaction.org/

Contact
Lisa Brockmeier
Communications Specialist
***@alliancebhc.org
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