Alluvion Health has been awarded $237,000 from the Health Resource Service Administration that the agency will use to expand the availability of Medication Assisted Treatment, or MAT, services to combat opioid addiction.
The funding will be used to train additional providers so that they can prescribe Suboxone, a medication that blocks the effects of opioids so a patient can’t get high them, according to Nell Ryan, a nurse practitioner at Alluvion.
“It’s a delicate medication,” Ryan said.
Providers are required to complete additional training to be able to prescribe the medication and in the first year of their certification, those providers can only treat 30 patients.
Doctors need an additional eight hours of training; nurses and physicians assistants need 24 hours of additional training, Ryan said, to prescribe Suboxone, which is typically administered as a film that dissolves on the tongue.
Currently, Ryan said Alluvion has three nurse practitioners able to prescribe Suboxone and with the grant funding, they’re hoping to train three more providers to double their capacity to treat patients.
Ryan said Alluvion currently has 60 patients in MAT, so they have room for about 30 more patients with their current providers, but with the local need, they want to double that capacity.
The program is only for patients with opiate abuse disorder and patients can get treatment at any of Alluvion’s locations: the main site at 601 1st Ave. S.; Gateway and the City-County Health Department.
Alluvion couples MAT with counseling to address a patient’s underlying causes of substance abuse.
Earlier this week, Montana officials said deaths from opioid overdose has declined since 2009 when it was 9 deaths per 100,000 people to 2.3 in 2017.
According to the Montana Department of Health and Human Services, 345 Montanans died from a drug overdose between 2015-2017. Of those, 86, or 25 percent, were due to opioids.
DPHHS estimated that 43,000 Montanans aged 12 older had misused opioid medication in 2015 through 2016 and $5 million was charged by Montana hospitals for opioid related hospitalizations and emergency department visits in 2017.
Suboxone helps curb cravings, Ryan said, but it’s uncomfortable for patients since they have to be in partial withdrawl for a precise amount of time before getting the medication.
She said they typically see patients most frequently at the beginning of treatment, but less over time as their cravings lessen.
“It’s an intensive treatment,” she said that’s tailored to a patient’s craving level.
It helps them feel normal, she said, and is safer than getting heroin or prescription pills off the street.
“It’s a harm reduction model,” Ryan said.
Addiction causes a feeling of powerlessness, Ryan said, so finding a treatment that works for patients can help them feel normal and get their lives back.
Once patients have been on the Suboxone film for at least a year, there’s an option to use a monthly injection, Ryan said, but the program is coupled with counseling to help patients address underlying issues and lessen the chance of relapsing.
The grant will also be used to purchase a patient transport vehicle to reduce the transportation barrier for those seeking substance use disorder treatment.
