Take-home naloxone kits now available at Richmond Hospital
Overdose visits to the Richmond Hospital emergency room are up 60 per cent in 2016
In the wake of the ever-worsening opioid crisis, Richmond Hospital is the latest facility in the Lower Mainland to offer take-home naloxone kits.
B.C. Medical Health Officer Dr. Meena Dewar says overdose visits to the Richmond Hospital emergency room are up 60 per cent in 2016.
This, despite a B.C. Coroner's report released Wednesday which pegged the suburban municipality as having the lowest number of overdoses per capita in the province.
Within next few weeks, naloxone kits will be available at Transitions centre in Richmond <a href="https://t.co/uhAjgpK4ln">pic.twitter.com/uhAjgpK4ln</a>
—@FarrahMeraliNaloxone is a medication that can reverse the effects of an opiod overdose caused by drugs like fentanyl, oxycodone, morphine, methadone and heroin.
The B.C. Coroner says there have been 488 illicit drug overdose deaths in the province between Jan. 1 and Aug. 30 of this year, and earlier this year, B.C. health officials declared opioid overdoses a public health emergency.
The kits are already available at St. Paul's, Vancouver General and Lions Gate hospitals.
All 14 urgent care and emergency departments in the Vancouver Coastal Health district are slated to have take-home naloxone available in the next few months.
The kits are also available at 65 additional sites in the Vancouver Coastal Health district, including homeless shelters and some community centres.