Recent News

CDC: Opioid prescriptions down, but still overprescribed (WTOP)

Jul 10th, 2017

WASHINGTON — New data from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention find opioid prescriptions are down nationwide, but are still overprescribed.

Baltimore City Health Commissioner Leana Wen said it’s good news that opioid prescriptions are down in the State of Maryland from the high of 2010, but doctors are still too quick to prescribe opioid drugs. She said the over-prescription of the highly addictive drug continues to be a huge problem.

“There are enough prescriptions for opioids given so that every adult American can have their own bottle,” Wen said.

Nearly 700 Baltimore City residents died from opioid overdose, said Wen, and even though the state awarded more money for the opioid reversal drug naloxone just last week, they can’t keep up with demands.

Read the entire story. 

The war on Maryland's opioid epidemic gets new funding (Fox 45)

Jul 10th, 2017

The state of Maryland is pouring millions of dollars into the fight against heroin and opioid abuse.

The Governor’s office announced on Friday that it’ll provide more than $22 million dollars into the effort.

The funds will be spread among the state’s 24 local jurisdictions.

Two-million dollars will be used to operate a crisis and stabilization center in Baltimore.

“The stabilization center is meant for individuals to stay for sobering,” said Baltimore Health Commissioner Dr. Lena Wen.

Read the entire story. 

Baltimore gets $2 million for 'sobering center' as part of larger opioid prevention efforts (Baltimore Sun)

Jul 10th, 2017

Baltimore City will get $2 million to open a 24-hour "sobering center" to help those addicted to drugs, part of a larger pool of money the state is giving out to every county to fight the heroin and opioid epidemic.

The Governor's Office of Crime Control & Prevention announced Friday how the more than $22 million would be distributed among the state's 24 jurisdictions. The money comes from funds the governor committed to fight the opioid epidemic, the federal government's 21st Century Cures Act and the state's crime control and prevention agency.

Eighty percent of the $22 million will go to local jurisdictions; the rest will be used to fund other efforts and programs, including collaboration between federal, state and local law enforcement, to increase state regulatory oversight of controlled dangerous substances, increase the number of beds in residential drug treatment centers, and make improvements to the statewide crisis hotline

The city health department will also receive $750,000 to buy 20,000 doses of naloxone, the drug used to reverse an opioid overdose that health officials have had to ration because of a shortage. The city will get another $830,429 to fund treatment programs and other efforts to curb the number of opioid deaths and overdoses. City officials can also apply for grants that would make them eligible for up to $6 million in total funding, said Katie Kuehn, communications director with the state's opioid operational command center. The grant money is not guaranteed, however.

City Health Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen said that although the money would help efforts to fight the opioid epidemic, the city should have received a larger proportion because it has been hit harder by the crisis than any other jurisdiction.

Read entire story. 

How does healthcare actually work? (Viceland)

Jul 7th, 2017

Linette Lopez, Dr. Leana Wen, and Dr. Jay Parkinson discuss the money behind health—whether or not you need an expensive doctor, and how the healthcare industry actually works.

Watch the video.

5 things to know about the race to identify new deadly opioids (Becker's Hospital Review)

Jul 7th, 2017

As newer and stronger synthetic opioids and synthetic opioid combinations continue to cause overdose flare-ups across the United States, Crime labs are working to identify these unfamiliar drugs.

A new report from STAT examined the issue. Here are five key takeaways from the report.

1. While the opioid analogs fentanyl and carfentanil — an elephant tranquilizer lethal for humans in minute doses — are now widely known, new analogs are cropping up in communities scattered across the nation.

...

5. In Baltimore, firefighters responding to 911 calls and emergency room physicians now report sudden upticks in opioid overdoses to Leana Wen, MD, the city's health commissioner, who can dispatch outreach teams to hard-hit areas of the city in the same day.

Read the entire article.

Baltimore teens built a system that sends text alerts during heroin overdose spikes (Technically)

Jul 7th, 2017

Since October, a group of six teenagers have been meeting for three hours on Saturdays at Code in the Schools’ offices in Station North. They’re working on a tool that utilizes mobile phones to address one aspect of the city’s heroin crisis.

Bad Batch Alert sends text messages to alert people to a spike in overdoses in a given area.

The application amplifies data from Emergency Medical Services that gets analyzed by the Baltimore City Health Department. The application is designed to let loved ones or neighbors know when people are overdosing at a high rate in a given area, indicating the presence of a dangerous batch of heroin that could be tainted with a substance like fentanyl.

Read the entire story. 

CDC finds uneven progress on reducing reliance on addictive opioids (Baltimore Sun)

Jul 7th, 2017

Fewer opioid painkillers are being prescribed to patients in half of U.S. counties, including most in Maryland, in recent years, but the amount remains three times what it was in 1999, according to new figures released Thursday by the U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

The CDC and other public health officials have sought to curb prescriptions of these potent, but addictive painkillers because they are seen as a key contributor to the nationwide overdose epidemic. Users become hooked on them and later turn to cheaper and more deadly street drugs such as heroin.

Read the entire story.

20-Year Gap In Life Expectancy Between Richer, Poorer Areas Of Baltimore (CBS)

Jul 7th, 2017

New numbers show, in Baltimore, it really depends on where you grew up, according to the health department.

“When it comes down to it, the biggest driver is poverty,” says Health Department Commissioner Dr. Leana Wen.

New data says a baby born in a neighborhood like Homeland or Roland Park can expect to live to 84 years old. In Fells Point, Canton and Federal Hill, the life expectancy is around 79.

But in Clifton, Greenmount East, Sandtown or Druid Heights, the life expectancy is under 70. Those numbers are far below the city-wide average of 74.

Read the entire article. 

Note from the Commissioner: Rationing Naloxone

Jul 7th, 2017

In Baltimore City, two people a day die of overdose. We need more support proportional to the demand for resources and disease severity.

We are rationing naloxone, the opioid overdose reversal medication, because we are running out while the demand grows. We only have about 4,000 naloxone kits remaining. If we gave out the kits as needed during our outreach around the city, we would run out in two weeks. Instead, it is expected that we stretch the kits until next summer. With more than 1,000 lives saved by residents using naloxone, we should not have to strategically choose who lives or dies.

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Kaiser, Bon Secours join forces on plan to improve health through economic opportunity (Baltimore Sun)

Jul 5th, 2017

Under normal circumstances they would be competitors, but two Baltimore health systems are combining resources to create economic opportunities to address health disparities in the sickest neighborhoods in the state.

Kaiser Permanente of the Mid-Atlantic States announced Wednesdaythat it is giving Bon Secours Baltimore Health System $1.7 million to build a community resource center that officials hope will spur economic opportunity in communities that are part of the 21223 ZIP code of West Baltimore.

The two health systems think that increasing residents' ability to get jobs and earn a living will eventually improve their health.

Read the entire story. 

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