HJBR Nov/Dec 2019

Healthcare Journal of BATON ROUGE I  NOV / DEC 2019 43 Rebekah E. Gee, MD, MPH Secretary Louisiana Department of Health harm in our communities. That is why the department is committed to provid- ing communities with the tools they need to get people access to services, includ- ing medication-assisted treatment. In January, methadone, the most com- mon medication-assisted treatment, will become available through the Healthy Louisiana Medicaid program. We believe this will be an important first step for people seeking to enter recovery support services, many of whom give up, or drasti- cally reduce their income to focus on their recovery. Last month, the department spoke to a woman who is on her third try in complet- ing substance abuse rehabilitation suc- cessfully; all three programs were funded under the Medicaid program. She talked about how thankful she was that the Med- icaid program did not ask her why she hadn’t been successful during the previous two tries at recovery. The Department of Health understands that relapse is part of recovery. The department is also concerned about the over-prescription of opioid pain med- ication, which peaked at 1.2 for every one resident at its peak in 2013. That number has steadily decreased, but at 96 prescrip- tions per 100 people, the rate is still too high. The department is in the midst of a push to increase the use of the state’s pre- scription monitoring program, especially in coordination with other states to share data. The department also wants to increase professional awareness and education for prevention and treatment of opioids, as well as the use of naloxone and med- ication-assisted treatment. The Office of Behavioral Health is working on several partnerships with higher education insti- tutions and associations to broaden efforts to educate. The Department of Health recognizes the importance of harm reduction, and is working with five communities across the state to roll out syringe service programs that we hope to expand in the future. The programs aim to reduce the sharing of needles, which has been shown to increase HIV and hepatitis C rates. We also want to reduce the public’s exposure to discarded syringes. In addition to these efforts, the depart- ment has set a goal of focusing on quality treatment services by growing the provider network, especially through strengthening provider requirements through the Med- icaid program. We are refining our mon- itoring of treatment with a protocol that will use metrics as part of the Medicaid program. We believe that people can and do over- come addiction, and through education, prevention, and quality treatment, the department is dedicated to transforming lives, families, and communities. n