Empowering Communities to Fight the Opioid Epidemic

Executive Summary

There are approximately 2.5 Million people who abuse Opioids. Of that, 200,000 people have access to addiction treatment and those who don’t fall into the 78 people die per day. In 2013, overdoses from prescription opioid pain relievers claimed more than 16,200 lives, with more than 145,000 people dying from overdoses in the last decade. Region VIII has an Opioid Epidemic/PDA Consultation Team. The purpose of the team is to proactively engage and support Region VIII states and tribes response to the public health crisis of prescription drug abuse and opioid addiction. This team has representatives from across the Department of Health and Human Services as well as the federal government. There is no comprehensive, coordinated response to the Opioid Epidemic across Federal, Tribal and State agencies and Local communities.

This team will develop a Regional Community Opioid Consultation Toolkit modeled after the Administration for Children and Families Office of Child Support Enforcement Toolkit. The Toolkit will include resources for staff providing T/A to states, tribes and local communities to implement or improve their response to the crisis of prescription drug abuse and opioid addiction. It will include an evaluation continuum, evidence-based summaries, and templates for providing consultative technical assistance based on intervention components that have been successful. This team seeks to create a condition where local communities, States, Tribal Nations, and Federal agencies can partner, collaborate, learn and successfully develop a coordinated and comprehensive response to the Opioid Epidemic.

A project supported by the: HHS Ignite Accelerator

Team Members

Charles Smith (Project Lead), SAMSHA
Chad Edinger, ACF
Christina Mead, HRSA

Milestones

January 2017: Project selected into the HHS Ignite Accelerator
February 2017: Time in the Accelerator began