West Virginia
University of Charleston to soon open drug abuse prevention outpatient clinic
CHARLESTON — For people grappling with substance abuse, basic health care can be fraught with worry: over-the-counter cough medicine can have relapse-triggering amounts of alcohol, and visits to the dentist are hazardous if they include narcotic painkillers.
A new outpatient clinic at the University of Charleston, likely the first of its kind in the state, hopes to make those anxious decisions easier when it opens later this month.
The vision for the free clinic is a one-stop information center for patients and practitioners, where issues like medication side effects and appropriate pain treatment for recovering addicts can be addressed.
The latter can be an especially hard question, with doctors worried about prescribing to addicts and patients resigning themselves to severe pain to avoid the chance of relapse. The abuse of opioid painkillers like oxycodone, hydrocodone and methadone, is a nationwide problem, but is particularly acute in Appalachia.
“It’s actually unethical not to treat people appropriately, but the question is, what’s the best treatment for someone with an addiction?,” said Michael O’Neil, the pharmacy professor who will oversee the clinic and the chairman of the state Controlled Substance Advisory Board.
After being examined, patients will be given wallet-sized cards telling them what kind of medication or treatment is appropriate for certain types of pain, without putting them at risk of slipping back into addiction.
The clinic will also work with people frustrated by side effects of prescription medicine, and with those who want to know what types of drugs are safer for recovering addicts.
O’Neil also sees the clinic as a way to educate physicians, dentists and other prescribers on some of the best practices for providing routine medical care to people with addictions.
“That’s probably one of the biggest problems we have, is lack of education among providers,” O’Neil said. “If you start educating the physicians and the dentists, they can affect a lot of people.”
According to the federal Drug Enforcement Agency, four of the five states where hydrocodone had the highest per capita distribution in 2006 were in Appalachia — Tennessee, Kentucky, West Virginia and Alabama. Tennessee is also in the top five for oxycodone distribution, and Alabama ranks in the top 10 for methadone prescriptions.
With doctors legitimately prescribing those drugs more, there have also been rises in illicit use and fatal overdoses.
“There’s more of it around,” said Anne McGee, director of the Cabell County Substance Abuse Prevention Partnership. “With kids especially, it’s about access. What’s available?”
McGee is organizing the annual Cabell County drug abuse prevention summit on Thursday, which this year will be devoted to prescription drugs. As a gauge of the issue’s gravity, the conference will have not only local participation, but a scheduled address from Frances Harding, director of the federal Center for Substance Abuse Prevention.
Last month, the Journal of the American Medical Association published a study showing that 93 percent of West Virginia’s 295 unintentional overdose deaths in 2006 involved opioid painkillers.
- West Virginia
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As session ends, ethics, tax items stalled
Measures offering ultrasound images to women seeking abortions and creating a single agency to manage the state’s vehicle fleet were among those sent to Gov. Joe Manchin on Saturday as West Virginia’s Legislature wound down its regular session.
With the economy still weak from the recession, lawmakers and Manchin both worked from hemmed-in agendas during the 60-day session.
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Snow hampered helicopter rescue
Three hours after a Navy helicopter crashed last month in West Virginia’s snow-covered mountains, National Guard medic Casey Dunfee cracked his cable on the floor of a Blackhawk rescue helicopter to break the ice and lowered himself hundreds of feet to the wreckage below.
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Varied topics left for W.Va. lawmakers
West Virginia’s Legislature headed toward the end of its regular session Friday with just a handful of measures from its recession-inhibited workload left on the agenda.
On the eve of the 60-day session’s midnight finish, the House and Senate began exchanging a final batch of bills that include several items from Gov. Joe Manchin’s agenda.
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W.Va. gets $22M for ‘bad schools’
Nearly $22 million in federal stimulus money will help West Virginia’s worst schools take drastic measures, including replacing principals and overhauling curriculum, U.S. Secretary of Education Arne Duncan announced Thursday.
West Virginia is the first state to receive money through the federal School Improvement Grants program, which seeks to improve student performance by targeting chronically low-performing schools.
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Dead bills pile up in W.Va. Legislature
Teenage tanners, seat belt scofflaws and adults who text while driving are among those who will evade further legislative restriction this year.
With three days to go before the regular legislative session ends, Thursday was the last day for most bills to reach the full House or Senate in time for a final vote.
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W.Va. Senate bolsters proposed FY11 budget
Federal stimulus dollars and a recent pension funding change have allowed West Virginia’s Senate to tweak the upcoming state budget by $248 million.
But the amended budget bill unanimously passed Wednesday still cuts general revenue spending by $47 million from what the Legislature passed last year.
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Proposed fees may doom election funding bill
The head of the Senate Finance Committee warned that the governor’s proposal to publicly finance state Supreme Court races could be derailed by concerns over the fees it would charge.
Senate Finance Chairman Walt Helmick, a Pocahontas County Democrat, questioned whether his committee would consider the legislation after it advanced late Monday from the Senate Judiciary Committee.
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Mountain State cities may get more freedom
State lawmakers appear ready to increase the independence of West Virginia’s local governments, and they aren’t waiting on results from an ongoing experiment on the subject.
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Lawmakers entering session’s crunch time
West Virginia’s Legislature has less than a week to decide the fate of proposals targeting abortion, corporate political spending and prescription drug abuse.
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Foreman says mine boss ordered him to fake records
A mining foreman accused of forging safety inspection reports at a West Virginia coal mine says his boss put profit ahead of potential danger, telling him to stop production and evacuate the mine only if a federal inspector was watching.
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As session ends, ethics, tax items stalled
