BRIDGEPORT, W.Va. — There is often a common refrain among the average citizen who attends a forum, conference, or meeting pertaining to substance abuse: “When can we stop talking and start doing?”
That wasn’t the case at All Saint’s Catholic Church in Bridgeport, Tuesday night.
“A new application that can be used to track overdoses, fatal and non-fatal,” Bill Ihlenfeld, the former U.S. Attorney for West Virginia’s Northern District, said Tuesday night. “It is in compliance with HIPPA (Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996). There is no PII (Personally Identifiable Information) that is involved. It helps to paint a nice picture of what the problem is within a particular community, within a particular state, or really in the entire country.”
The smart-phone application is currently in a pilot testing program, but Ihlenfeld says it will provide law enforcement and community prevention partners with a simple, indispensable tool: information.
“It would inform law enforcement on perhaps where patrols should be increased,” Ihlenfeld, now a lawyer at Bailey & Glasser in Wheeling, said. “It would also inform public health on where resources should be shifted. Maybe prevention resources need to go to a particular neighborhood or area.”
More than ever, as West Virginia continues to grapple with it’s opioid abuse epidemic, experts say prevention is the best way to improve outcomes.
“Our numbers are up for youth in West Virginia not using because it’s reached that cycle where it’s reaching younger children,” Jo Anne McNemar, Coordinator for the Harrison County Prevention Partnership, said Tuesday. “We start younger and younger with pre-school on up. Even with pregnant moms, so it starts in vitro.”
For McNemar, that’s one of the most important, if not the most important, goals for the Prevention Partnership.
“The longer we can delay the onset of first use, the longer that brain can develop and make some good, healthy, accurate choices,” McNemar added.
Ihlenfeld, who is advising Governor Jim Justice as part of a committee on drug abuse, said Harrison County has an opportunity to join the pilot program of the information-based app at no financial cost.
“That’s the best part about it,” he said. “There’s no cost. It just takes the time of police officers, medical professionals, and EMT’s actually entering the information into the system. Then it tracks overdoses on a real-time basis.”
The application’s inception begins with the Baltimore HIDTA, and Ihlenfeld said West Virginia’s inclusion in that group has already helped provide information to first responders in the state’s Eastern Panhandle.
“There would have to be buy-in from first responders,” he said. “The key to the system working is first responders actually entering data into the system.”
McNemar said citizens who really want to make an actionable difference should come to the next Harrison County Prevention Partnership meeting and play a role in helping develop the next strategic action plan, possibly incorporating this application into Harrison County’s local drug abuse battle.
“Just to come to learn,” she said. “Don’t be afraid to ask. Don’t be afraid to do.”
That, Ihlenfeld said, is an important step.
“Even if Governor Justice were to roll out the best plan we’ve ever heard, you’re still going to have to do something locally,” he said. “You can’t count on Charleston or Washington to fix the problem.”
Joining Ihlenfeld in presenting were Huntington Mayor Steve Williams and Drug Control Policy Director Jim Johnson, Harrison County Sheriff Robert Matheny, and a number of community outreach and public health experts.
The Harrison County Prevention Partnership will next meet March 7 at 6 p.m. at All Saint’s Catholic Church in Bridgeport.