Writing Samples

Fighting the battle against drug addiction

by Kevin Dowler - Health Matters staff writer hmhealthmatters.com

With more than 30 years of health care work experience, Linda Levesque was surprised how naive she was when it came to the world of the drug addict. She became aware of her naivety after she was exposed to drug-user jargon in her work as the clinical program manager with the Saskatchewan HealthLine – a toll-free help line where registered nurses are available to answer health care questions. Levesque learned it is imperative to know the language of drug users so HealthLine staff understand what drug-addicted callers are talking about and can give them the help they need.

Levesque discovered more about illegal drug use through HealthLine’s increased scope in dealing with callers looking for help with their addictions. In April, Saskatchewan HealthLine staff received additional training and access to information about addictions problems. The training was part of the battle against crystal methamphetamine through the Saskatchewan Government’s Project Hope, a three-year plan to prevent and treat substance abuse. Through this project, many stakeholders such as emergency service workers, health care professionals and parents hope to stop crystal methamphetamine and other addictive drugs from spreading any farther into Saskatchewan communities.

Warnings echoing from one rural town to the next of how fast crystal methamphetamine spreads and becomes a common street drug made Saskatchewan’s health care administrators and politicians listen. In the $10-million Project Hope plan, the government is including methods to offer voluntary treatment to help addicted youth who are considered at-risk of causing serious harm to themselves or others. Some of the program’s implementation began in October, with most of the community-based services beginning in July 2006. Project Hope will attack the drug at the user level with prevention programs, and at the treatment level by adding more mental health and addictions specialists and the addition of more detox treatment beds. Throughout the province, there are currently 89 detoxification, 164 in-patient and nine long-term residential addictions treatment beds in 13 facilities, and 50 regional health authority and community-based outpatient programs. The project will also hire extra staff to take on crystal methamphetamine, as well as other street level drugs. Levesque and other HealthLine registered nurses are among those staff. HealthLine plays an important role in Project Hope because registered nurses can be contacted by anyone with access to a telephone, any time – day or night. They assess individual needs for information, medical care or referral to addictions counselling at locations across the province. “We are about linking, not about solving the problem,” says Rae Schier, Health Line’s nurse manager.

The increased focus on addictions came as a result of a jump in crystal methamphetamine use in the province. Crystal methamphetamine is a hard-hitting, highly-addictive drug with the potential to become the number one street drug in Saskatchewan. It has already made its way into towns and cities, and found addicts throughout Saskatchewan. Because of the surprising popularity of the drug, it has also gained a high position in the media. A positive effect of its repeated media appearances is that people know about it and its danger. “We find that the two most talked about addictions are crystal methamphetamine and nicotine,” says Tamara Sheppard, an addictions counsellor with Saskatoon Health Region’s Mental Health and Addiction Services. “It’s really opened people’s eyes to see that this drug is in our own backyards.”

With crystal methamphetamine use, the drug can quickly become a drug addict’s favourite and their life soon moves into a downward spiral where their daily motivations move from the more conventional urges like ‘I want to get something to eat’ to ‘I want to get high.’ For around $10, a crystal methamphetamine user can get a rush of energy followed by a high that lasts anywhere from four to 12 hours, compared with about a 20-minute high from crack cocaine that costs about the same amount of money. As a stimulant, crystal methamphetamine use can lead to days without sleeping or eating. Someone high on crystal methamphetamine is usually highly agitated, and can become aggressive and violent. The combination of crystal methamphetamine’s long-lasting, high-energy, euphoric high and its low cost is quickly making it the drug of choice for Saskatchewan drug users. Chronic use of the drug – more than six to 12 months of use – is known to cause: compulsive fascination with useless repetitive tasks, severe psychological addiction to the drug, depression, erectile dysfunction, long-term cognitive impairment, tooth decay, immune system damage and even death.

The abundant media attention on crystal methamphetamine has brought more attention to addictions problems in Saskatchewan. In Sunrise Health Region, the director of public health, mental health and addictions sees the media coverage of crystal methamphetamine as positive for addictions treatment. “All of the media attention that crystal methamphetamine has received has helped us to move forward in our addictions strategy and get the message out that this is not the only addiction problem we have,” Ed Sorsdahl says from his Yorkton office. “Alcohol is still the major addiction problem of youth.” And by becoming a very visible social issue, the problem – brought to the forefront because of the danger from crystal methamphetamine – has increased the awareness of different addiction problems in Saskatchewan communities.
In Melfort, Rick Peters is the director of mental health and addictions for the Kelsey Trail Health Region. He says alcohol is the number one problem in their region with marijuana ranking number two. Crystal methamphetamine is present in the Kelsey Trail region, but it isn’t yet an overwhelming threat. “In the addictions community we take the clinical view of a drug, is a drug, is a drug. Crystal methamphetamine is just one of the varieties of drugs people can develop addiction problems with,” Peters says. Weyburn has also seen a similar amount of crystal meth use. The drug has been sold as ecstasy, usually in a pill form, or mixed in marijuana to give it a better boost or to introduce potential new users to the drug. The drug can be swallowed, snorted, smoked, injected or even taken as a suppository. Some pill forms of the drug are coloured and flavoured to mimic candy. “Our biggest concern is users being unaware of what they are taking and that it may be crystal meth,” says Gary Tedford, coordinator of addictions services in the Sun Country Health Region.

The drug’s effect goes far beyond the damage to the life and health of the user and their family and community; the problem the drug creates has resulted in a higher number of drug abusers in the province, which drives up health care costs. The addict’s physical breakdown results in an increase in medical needs because of negative side effects caused by the drug’s use. One of the first signs of the drug’s impact on the health care system is the increase in security in many emergency departments because staff are faced with dangerous situations when addicts use emergency for treatment. There is also an increase in outpatient care so additional stress is put on health care facilities as more hospital beds are being used to treat addicts with long-term damage or for detoxification treatment. “The new programs will increase our abilities in addictions treatment,” Sorsdahl says.

Like Sorsdahl, other addictions workers are hopeful they will see a change because of the new programs being implemented. Sheppard likes what she sees so far. “There is no cookie cutter plan that is going to solve the addictions problem that people have to go through the pain and suffering of, but I am very respectful and optimistic of this plan and the way it has begun.”