Please respond to the following 2 discussion posts……
1. Travis D Posted
Good evening class,
I chose to write about option two for this discussion post with regards to the nations opioid epidemic that is continuously growing every day. I think that every human no matter what the situation may be has the right to be saved thru emergent care with or without addiction if it is needed for them to survive. I also believe that the community should give these people who are fighting these types of addictions some kind of resources for their use to try to help them in life to fight this epidemic. I do also at the same time think that we need to come up with new ways to create our budgets for every community across the country so that smaller communities entire budgets are not just for fighting this epidemic.
“In 2019, nearly 50,000 people in the United States died from opioid-involved overdoses.” (Opioid Overdose Crisis, 2021) Seeing statistics like this really opened my eyes to see how big this issue really is in our country. The cost that goes along with this statistic across our country as well is really eye opening. It is costing the communities across the country billions of dollars each year to deal with this epidemic currently happening. I think that the communities across the country need to use their resources meaningfully, and not be wasteful in order for us to effectively control this epidemic. I think also maybe we should create tiers or levels for each of these opioid users the community may come in contact with for care to determine the resources available.
Travis
References
Opioid Overdose Crisis. (2021, July 1). Drugabuse.Gov. Retrieved October 16, 2021, from https://www.drugabuse.gov/drug-topics/opioids/opioid-overdose-crisis
2. Aaron M Posted…..
The opioid crisis is a subject that I deal with closely every day. I am a Certified Peer Recovery Specialist based in a large Level one Trauma hospital in Tennessee. I work out of the Emergency Department and deal with the patients who come in for many addiction-based issues. We work with patients who suffer from any substance use disorder. Many of our patients are here due to opiates. Overdoses are the lesser of the medical emergencies that bring those who suffer into the hospital. While the number of overdoses is climbing higher, especially with synthetic opioids such as fentanyl, infectious diseases such as MERSA, abscesses, sepsis, HIV, and Hepatitis are our main battles. These pose quite a health risk to the community. I believe that much of the stigma attached to addiction is due to a lack of knowledge—we as an organization host many events and teaching seminars with doctors and nurses. As team members in active recovery, we also show by example that most addicts are capable of recovery and contributing to society.