Naloxone kits more readily available

February 18, 2016

One more avenue for opioid users to access naloxone kits is one more opportunity to combat the growing numbers of fentanyl-related deaths. 

On Thursday, the provincial government announced that pharmacies across Alberta can provide take-home kits free-of-charge for those with prescriptions. Naloxone can be used to temporarily reverse an overdose of fentanyl or other opioids, allowing a person time to get emergency medical help.

“We acknowledge that people who use drugs come from all walks of life and so, maybe there are the folks who use drugs and they come from suburbia and they’re not so comfortable coming to the inner city or the locations that already exist,” said Matthew Wong, who works with the overdose prevention program with Streetworks, which is part of the Boyle McCauley Health Centre, in Edmonton’s inner city.

Now, almost one-third of Alberta’s 1,100 pharmacies have signed on to provide take-home naloxone kits. Select pharmacists can write prescriptions and will spend 15 to 30 minutes talking to the opioid user on how to prevent an overdose, how to recognize an overdose, and what steps to take when a person ceases breathing.

At the end of last summer, the province gave funding to harm reduction agencies and walk-in clinics, such as Boyle McCauley, to provide naloxone to opioid users. Presently, naloxone is available by prescription at 44 walk-in clinics and eight harm reduction sites across the province.

While there has been an increasing interest in naloxone, Boyle McCauley has not run out of kits and that is not a comfort for Wong.

“We want more people coming in. We want to train as many people as possible,” he said.

Why more people aren’t accessing the kits is “complicated,” he says.

“There’s a little bit of stigma associated with the kits as well. Our general message is, if you use drugs, anybody who uses drugs can be at risk for overdose and having a kit is a just-in-case thing and being proactive to take care of your health and the health of the people you know and care about as well,” said Wong.

Naloxone right now is a prescription-only medication, but an application has been made to Health Canada to reschedule the drug so that it is no longer a prescription-only medication but may be accessed over-the-counter, says Wong, who adds that the federal government is trying to expedite that change.

Naloxone is stocked on most emergency response vehicles, notes Wong, with paramedics and now EMTs able to administer the drug.

Fentanyl is also a concern on First Nations, with the Blood Tribe declaring a state of emergency in 2015.

“Fentanyl is one of the biggest issues we are facing right now,” said Tyler White, CEO of Siksika Health Service. “It’s a critical issue and it requires brave leadership.”

A Fentanyl Response Team, made up of frontline health care workers, communities, First Nations and Métis representatives, and health experts meets regularly to help coordinate the government’s actions. 

In 2015, there were 272 overdose deaths involving fentanyl in Alberta, up from 120 in 2014. Illicit fentanyl is highly toxic and a very small amount can be deadly.

Wong says people don’t seek out fentanyl as much as realize too late that it has been cut into another recreational drug, in particular heroin, or that it is the only opioid available for the high.