Clark County recorded 20 overdose deaths in 2011 attributed to both prescription and illicit drugs. Several containers of illegal prescriptions were confiscated during a drug raid by the Clark County Sheriff¿s Office. By James Mann | jmann@winchestersun.com
Clark County officials responded to 20 drug overdose deaths in 2011, with 11 of them occurring during the last four months of the year.
Clark County Coroner Robert Gayheart, who has been the coroner since 2008, said 20 is not a particularly high or low number compared to past years.
Gayheart said that number doesn’t include people from Clark County who may have died from overdoses elsewhere.
“Those are the ones in-county that the Coroner’s Office worked,” he said.
These numbers come just after Gov. Steve Beshear called for a need to tackle prescription drug abuse during his State of the Commonwealth address last week. In his address, Beshear called prescription drug abuse “one of the largest threats to productivity and health in our communities,” and he cited a recent report that showed that more Kentuckians die from the prescription overdoses than from car accidents.
Beshear called for the strengthening of the Kentucky All Schedule Prescription Electronic Reporting system, or KASPER.
“During this session, you will be asked to consider a wide-ranging package of legislation designed to strengthen KASPER, including making participation mandatory and cracking down on pill pushers in white coats and on pill mills in Kentucky,” he said. “This legislation is vital for the health, safety, productivity and future of our people.”
KASPER was established about 10 years ago and is a system to track controlled substances dispensed within the state. Through the system, a physician can look up online or by phone whether or not another provider or pharmacist has already prescribed narcotics to a patient and when.
The drugs most often found in the Clark County-handled cases, Gayheart said, were opiates, or pain killers, and benzodiazepines, drugs often used to treat anxiety.
In 2009, there were almost 4.6 million drug-related visits to emergency rooms nationwide, according to the National Institute on Drug Abuse, a division of the National Institutes of Health. That number includes instances of drug abuse, adverse reactions to drugs or other drug-related consequences.
“Almost 50 percent were attributed to adverse reactions to pharmaceuticals taken as prescribed, and 45 percent involved drug abuse,” the website states.
In overdose deaths that Clark County officials responded to, Gayheart said the drugs used varied from prescription to street-purchased and abused.
Gayheart said increased community efforts through organizations like the Clark County Christian Drug Coalition have helped raise community awareness to the problem and how to solve it.
“I know there’s been a lot more community prayer focused on this,” Gayheart said. “I think that does have an impact.”
Janice Claypoole, senior minister at the Ark of Mercy Church of God, which oversees the Mercy House Drug and Rehabilitation Center at 246 Winn Ave., said one of the many challenges to solving the drug problem locally is providing enough treatment facilities.
“They need facilities ... safe places, where they can go, and a lot of times, they have no money,” she said. “They have no money to get in anywhere. So it just becomes a hopeless situation ... and so they just keep going in a vicious cycle.”
The Mercy House opened about three years ago, and it’s a 90-day or longer program for substance abusers who have gone through detox, Claypoole said. The facility offers programs including anger management, conflict solving and team challenges. Each person living at the facility has to go to Narcotics Anonymous or Alcoholics Anonymous classes.
Claypoole said the maximum capacity of the facility is 30, and as of Thursday, four were living there. That number was low, she said, because the facility just had a graduation, and applications for more participants will be accepted in the near future.
Claypoole said for most people she’s worked with, the problem of addiction arises in an effort to sedate pain.
“Each one that I talk to has a story that’s heartbreaking,” she said. “I have found it’s mostly people who have a lot of hurt from just life in general, failed relationships, and again, a lot of it comes from abuse.”
Another out-patient facility opened in Winchester six months ago. The Way to Recovery, 120 W. Broadway, is a faith-based intensive program that provides independent living for those who graduate from a detox program. Participants who live there ideally stay for a minimum of six months and a maximum of two years. They’re required to find employment and volunteer until they do, attend AA or NA meetings, attend Bible study and find a church to attend regularly.
John Pichler, the director of the facility, said since it opened in July, things have been going well, and facility leaders hope to expand its services further.
“Really our plan is to expand out farther into the surrounding counties. Our biggest issue is still awareness that people don’t know that we’re here and what we do,” he said. “I’m still having a lot of people coming in and saying ‘You know, we didn’t know you were here.’ And so just getting the awareness that we’re here, and we’re here to help, and not only in Clark County, but the surrounding counties as well.”
The facility has housed about 12 to 13 individuals in Winchester. Pichler said although some people leave before the minimum six months, others stay longer.
“I’ve got one young man who actually will have completed his six months on the 21st of this month, and he’ll be staying several more probably,” he said.
Pichler said the Way to Recovery has been partnering with several community organizations, including the Clark County Association of Churches, the Clark County Homeless Coalition, Clark County Community Services and the Clark County Christian Drug Coalition.
Because the Way to Recovery has never reached its housing capacity, it is now housing two homeless people through its association with the Clark County Homeless Coalition, Pichler said. Those people are required to follow the same requirements for staying there as everyone else.
The Way to Recovery and the Mercy House also help refer individuals needing addiction help to in-patient care treatment facilities. Those wanting to enter the Way to Recovery or Mercy House are required to graduate from a detox program first.
More information on Mercy House is available by calling 744-8745. Additional information on the Way to Recovery is available by calling 355-5517.
Contact Katie Perkowski at kperkowski@winchestersun.com or follow her on Twitter, @TheSunKatie.
