EMS Magazine Highlights Success of Drug Treatment Program Funded by UBalt Center Grant
September 29, 2022
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An ongoing effort to combat opioid overdoses in Philadelphia, and funded by a grant from The University of Baltimore's Center for Drug Policy and Prevention is highlighted in the October edition of EMS World magazine.
The center has distributed multiple rounds of grants to various neighborhood-oriented programs to curb drug overdoses via the Combating Overdose Through Community-level Intervention Initiative (COCLI), funded by the Office of National Drug Control Policy. In Philadelphia, a $265,000 award went to the Philadelphia Fire Department's AR-2 program, a street-level initiative to curb opioid overdoses and deaths inside a known drug-use part of the city.
According to EMS World, the COCLI grant provides funding for three EMT employees for one year, along with equipment in support of the overdose-reduction effort. The program is intended to "improve the treatment acceptance rate among overdose survivors," the magazine states. The AR-2 team frequent streets where opioids are used, looking for persons who may have overdosed. Intervention medicines are carried by the team; AR-2 members take steps to stop an opiod overdose, stabilize the patient's vital signs, then facilitate that person's placement into a rehabilitation setting.
Read the EMS World article about AR-2 and UBalt's COCLI grant for the initiative. (Article begins on page 16.)
Learn more about the Center for Drug Policy and Prevention.