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Opioid-Related Overdose

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Abstract This evidence based paper focuses on the rate of opioid related overdose and deaths, interventions types and its effectiveness, specifically naloxone. This paper details trends in abuse and mortality, interventions taken to reduce rates of overdose related deaths, Naloxone as an intervention, and it’s availability. The review of literature in this paper leads to the following research question: Does Narcan availability to family members of opioid abusers decrease opioid-related deaths? This question is answered using current research on opiate overdose and naloxone use. According to research by Dart et al, there has been an increase in the number of opioid-related deaths since 2010 and their research mapped …show more content…

More recently, numerous programs across the United States have distributed naloxone, paired with education on how to identify, prevent, and treat overdoses, to the lay public (e.g., friends and family members of people who use opioids). In addition to naloxone distribution programs for friends and family members of people who use opioids, programs training first responders like police, firefighters, and emergency medical technicians who traditionally have not been trained to use naloxone, have also demonstrated positive results [19,20]. Despite evidence of safety and efficacy, naloxone distribution programs, like other harm reduction interventions, face logistical and ideological challenges [21,22]. First, individuals who witness an overdose may not call for medical attention or administer naloxone because of legal concerns …show more content…

A majority believed that providing naloxone to first responders would save lives (60%); however, only 35.9% believed that providing naloxone to friends and family members would save lives. A similar percentage held negative beliefs about naloxone: 31.4% thought that distributing it will encourage people to use more opioid analgesics and 39.0% believed that preventing overdoses is ineffective because people will just continue to use and overdose again. Almost half of participants believed that naloxone administration should be restricted to medical professionals only. Our finding that factual information alone can significantly increase support for naloxone distribution policies suggests that educating the public about naloxone’s safety and efficacy will play an important role in garnering public

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