Biomaterial Database

Addressing the Opioid Crisis: Community Partnerships in Primary Care. 2019

Jamie Weinand, and Athena Huckaby, and Olivia Chavez, and Ramona Sharma, and Jeanette Lara, and Laura Leija, and Christopher Morriss, and Shawn Rowland, and Davena Norris, and Minerva Medrano de Ramirez, and Salvador Adame-Zambrano, and John Andazola, and Ivan De La Rosa

Memorial Medical Center, Southern New Mexico Family Medicine Residency Program, Las Cruces, NM.

BACKGROUND New Mexico is currently ranked 17th in the United States for drug overdose death rates. Our project seeks to decrease opioid overdose deaths in a community by increasing the number of patients with naloxone in a local family medicine residency clinic. METHODS We developed a protocol wherein providers asked patients at risk of opioid overdose about naloxone access. Free naloxone was distributed in partner with the county health department, accompanied by teaching of use. We reviewed patient encounters during a 45-day control and study period to measure naloxone possession among patients at risk. RESULTS Nearly two-thirds of patients at risk of opioid overdose had no naloxone. A standardized protocol implemented to distribute an opioid reversal agent doubled naloxone prescribed by providers at visits (10.3%) compared to a control period (4.3%), but lacked statistical significance. CONCLUSIONS Patients in a family medicine residency clinic who were at risk of opioid overdose overwhelmingly did not have naloxone, and a standardized protocol with a community-based partnership increased access to naloxone. Further project data will have implications for ongoing naloxone distribution programs in primary care.