National Alliance of Methadone Advocates
Date: January 12, 2004
For Immediate Release
Contact: Joycelyn Woods and Walter Ginter
Phone: (212) 595-6262
NAMA has been involved in a Methadone Emergency Database Project which will create a way to verify a patient’s dose in the case of an emergency. Now we hear that the Methadone Emergency Database Project, which we have been referring to as the “Patients Dignity Project”, is not going to be funded. Apparently, patient dignity, specifically, methadone patient dignity doesn’t have the support necessary.
Why This Is Project Called The Patient Dignity Project?
The reason we call it the patient dignity project is that it will allow patients to go to any program and eventually any hospital and get their medicine immediately in the event of an emergency. Currently, in an emergency, patients have to wait hours to have their doses verified. When that is not possible, and most times it is not, patients are given a few milligrams at a time by worried physicians. Patients are left begging for hours for more medication.
But MORE OFTEN THEY AREN’T MEDICATED AT ALL forcing many patients back to the streets from which they are escaping. That is why advocates call this the PATIENT DIGNITY PROJECT.
After September 11 many of us at NAMA became concerned about what would happen to methadone patients in the event of similar crisis. A number of groups, including NAMA formed a stakeholder committee to look into possible solutions for this problem and to insure that patients would never be turned away from programs again.
The Methadone Emergency Database Project
Patients need a way to get their medication in times of an emergency. The project, funded by the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT) has just completed its report and is ready to advance to a demonstration project in the New York, New Jersey, and Connecticut area. The report calls for the establishment of an emergency database that could be accessed only in the presence of the patient requesting his or her medication at a place other then the patients home program. The project calls for the use of a finger imaging system that besides being inexpensive and easy to maintain fully protects the rights, privacy and dignity of the patients.
NAMA has visited programs in the states involved. The patients interviewed were 100% in favor of the project.
What Happens Without The Methadone Emergency Database Project
In the past 2 years there have been at least 3 major emergencies, where despite the “emergencies plans” called for in the Accreditation Guidelines patients were left for between 1 and 3 days without medication. The Presidents Day Storm where at least 9 programs failed to open in the Mid Atlantic states, the east coast blackout, and the recent northeaster where hundreds of patients in Boston were left without medication despite repeated warnings about severe weather.
NAMA is aware that many patients were forced to resort to heroin during those emergencies. There is no way to tell the ultimate impact that this had on patients being forced into using again. Whatever the effects they can’t be good.
If an emergency database were available those patients could have gone to any program, and eventually any emergency room, to get their medicine.
What Should Happen Next?
The next stage is just a demonstration project and admittedly it will be several years before all the kinks are ironed out and it is ready to go national. But this is the start of a strategy to insure that ALL patients are able to get their medication no matter the crisis. By not being funded the project will be delayed further and we can’t wait another thirty-five years.
NAMA believes that this project is important and should take precedence over other projects. We encourage all advocates, methadone patients, friends and family of methadone patients and all concerned individuals to contact Mr. Curie of the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration (SAMHSA) and Dr. Clark of the Center for Substance Abuse Treatment (CSAT) and tell them that you care about the dignity of methadone patients and encourage them to fund the Methadone Emergency Database Project.
The email links for the esteemed gentlemen mentioned are listed below:
Mr. Curie
[email protected]
Dr. Clark
[email protected]
Please e-mail them today and tell them you support the Methadone Emergency Database Project. Ask your friends and family to do the same.