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Clean and healthy

THE BLADE

Clean and healthy

The epidemic of addiction gripping northwest Ohio and the rest of the nation should prompt sweeping changes in medical practices. Physicians must be better trained on how addiction works, not only to inform and regulate how they prescribe painkillers, but also to recognize the warning signs of substance abuse.

Addiction and other medical and health problems are not separate ailments but parts of a patient’s overall physical and psychological health. Doctors and other practitioners should treat them as such.

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A new partnership between Neighborhood Health Association and A Renewed Mind in Toledo could help lead the nation to more integrated treatment practices for people struggling with addiction. The partnership — girded by a new two-year, $352,000 federal grant to NHA — will expand medication-assisted treatment in the Toledo area and provide more comprehensive health care for patients struggling with drug addiction.

With 13 area health centers, NHA provides primary medical care and preventive medical and dental services to low-income, uninsured, and underinsured patients. A Renewed Mind is one of the region's largest substance abuse service providers.

The grant, awarded by the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, will enable A Renewed Mind to train the staff of Neighborhood Health Association to recognize symptoms of addiction in their primary health-care patients. NHA staff can then refer those patients for substance abuse treatment at A Renewed Mind.

Conversely, A Renewed Mind will refer its clients with other significant health and medical problems to Neighborhood Health Association for primary health care. The grant will enable NHA to hire additional medical staff, including a physician who is certified to prescribe Suboxone, an effective drug used in medication-assisted treatment to ease the agonizing symptoms of opioid withdrawal. So some patients will be able to get treated for addiction and other medical problems at one location.

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The partnership, which will start operating by the end of June, should enable an additional 200 patients to receive medication-assisted treatment in the Toledo area over the next two years.

Medication-assisted treatment, when coupled with counseling and other supports, has been far more successful in treating opioid addiction than traditional therapies. Now, 90 to 95 percent of patients at A Renewed Mind ask for medication-assisted treatment, Matthew Rizzo, the agency’s chief executive officer, told The Blade.

Not surprisingly, people struggling with addiction often have neglected their general health and developed numerous other ailments. In performing routine physicals for its clients, A Renewed Mind has detected various other health and medical problems, including breast cancer, diabetes, and hypertension.

A Renewed Mind and Neighborhood Health Association will document the results of their partnership. The federal government should use those findings to promote reforms in medical practices nationwide, including training physicians and other primary health-care providers to identify substance abuse.

With opioid abuse killing more than 200 people a year in the Toledo area alone, and gripping an estimated 10,000 more in the nightmare of addiction, those reforms are long overdue.

First Published May 3, 2016, 4:00 a.m.

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