×

UPMC Chautauqua WCA Expands Outpatient Capabilities

“You’re not sick enough” has long been a chilling refrain for drug users seeking help from a health care provider.

Since long-term treatment is granted only to those whose addiction is dire enough to warrant inpatient care, many users who fall short of this benchmark feel left in the lurch. Worse yet, when these users are diverted to outpatient clinics and receive counseling, many find the care insufficient and later relapse as a result.

Andy O’Brien, director of chemical dependency and mental health services at UPMC Chautauqua WCA, said the segment of patients that fall in between counseling and inpatient services represent a missing piece in the hospital’s substance abuse treatment system.

Filling this gap, he said, required an additional component to their existing outpatient services.

“We applied to the New York State Office of Alcohol and Substance Abuse Services (or OASAS) and recently received their approval to provide what they refer to as Outpatient Ancillary Withdrawal Services,” he said. “This service allows people to receive assistance from a physician at UPMC Chautauqua WCA, as well as ancillary staff, to help them taper off a drug, while at home or still going to work.”

O’Brien said the program is designed for people with “mild to moderate” addictions to alcohol, opiates or sedatives, who can’t afford to disrupt their personal and professional lives with hospitalization.

The program allows patients to safely receive medications like benzodiazepines and Librium for alcohol addiction and Suboxone for heroin addiction, instead of resorting to dangerous street-level purchases, O’Brien said.

“(Patients) can remain in our services as a regular outpatient and we may switch them to other medications, like Vivatrol … and change from tapering to a medication that helps reduce the craving or blocks the effect,” O’Brien said. “Sometimes a person might relapse and take an opiate, but because of the medications in their system, the opioid effect that makes them have pleasure is blocked as a result.”

Outpatient Ancillary Withdrawal Services are currently available at Jones Memorial Health Center, located at 51 Glasgow Ave. in Jamestown, and the Dunkirk Health Center, now located at 306 Central Ave. in Dunkirk.

Newsletter

Today's breaking news and more in your inbox

I'm interested in (please check all that apply)
Are you a paying subscriber to the newspaper? *
   

COMMENTS

Starting at $4.62/week.

Subscribe Today