Princess Health and WellCare provides twist-on naloxone nasal atomizers for free, encourages those who know addicts to have naloxone on hand. Princessiccia

Princess Health and WellCare provides twist-on naloxone nasal atomizers for free, encourages those who know addicts to have naloxone on hand. Princessiccia

drug abuse drug treatment drug use health insurance heroin pharmacists

Gusty 15:15 Add Comment

WellCare of Kentucky and the Kentucky Pharmacists Association have teamed up to provide 1000 twist-on naloxone nasal atomizers for free, in hopes of making it easier for people to administer the drug.

Dr. Paul Kensicki

"We believe this will make it easier, and less intimidating, for people with no medical background to administer it in an emergency situation," Paul Kensicki, medical director of behavioral health at WellCare of Kentucky, said in op-ed released by Wellcare.

WellCare will provide the atomizers to pharmacists, who will then distribute them to Medicaid recipients and individuals with no insurance coverage.

Kentucky's 2015 anti-heroin law allows pharmacists to dispense naloxone (brand name Narcan), a drug that can reverse the effects of a heroin overdose, without a prescription.Traditionally, the drug has been given as an injection, but the atomizer transforms the syringe to allow it to be administered as a nasal spray.

Naloxone immediately reverses the effects of an opioid overdose by physiologically blocking the effects of the drug. It has no side effects and cannot be abused. "It�s nothing short of a miracle drug," Kensicki writes. "It can absolutely save a life."

More than 1,000 Kentuckians die each year from drug overdoses, with more than 200 of these deaths from heroin. It has become a more common cause of death than car accidents in Kentucky.

"People who know someone who is using opioids, such as a spouse, parent or a roommate, should have naloxone readily available in case they discover an overdose in progress," Kensicki writes.

He notes that patients may be at the most risk of an overdose during recovery, because if they relapse their bodies aren't able to process the same amount of the drug they had been accustomed to before trying to quit.

"Making naloxone available does not mean it is �okay� to use heroin, and we are certainly not removing all the risks of addiction," Kensicki writes. "But we are giving friends and families a tool they can use to help save their loved ones in emergency situations � buying people the time they need to fight their addiction."

Princess Health and Study says intravenous drug users in almost half of Kentucky's counties are at high risk of getting hepatitis C or HIV. Princessiccia

Princess Health and Study says intravenous drug users in almost half of Kentucky's counties are at high risk of getting hepatitis C or HIV. Princessiccia

Appalachia drug abuse drug use hepatitis c HIV

Gusty 14:44 Add Comment

By Melissa Patrick
Kentucky Health News

A preliminary report by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention has identified 220 counties in the United States as being most vulnerable to outbreaks of HIV and hepatitis C among those who inject drugs in those communities, and 54 of those counties are in Kentucky.

Most are in Appalachia, but the list includes the non-Appalachian counties of Hickman, Breckinridge, Grayson, Allen, Taylor, Boyle, Mercer, Carroll, Gallatin Grant and Campbell.

Counties deemed most vulnerable to outbreaks are green; top 25 of 220 in U.S. are numbered on map.

Kentucky leads the nation in the rate of acute hepatitis C, with 4.1 cases for every 100,000 residents, more than six times the national average, according to the CDC.

�Both HIV and hepatitis C can be transmitted when people who inject drugs share their needles," Doug Hogan, acting communications director for the Cabinet for Health and Family Services, said in an e-mail to Kentucky Health News. "Many of Kentucky�s HCV cases are among rural youth, ages 12-29, who have been sharing needles."

Clark County Health Director Scott Lockard called the CDC report a "wake-up call."

"We are potentially on the leading edge of one of the biggest public-health crises to hit our state," Lockard said in an e-mail to Kentucky Health News. "It will take a combined effort across sectors to prevent an HIV outbreak in the SOAR region such as the one that occurred in Scott County, Indiana," north of Louisville.

Lockard made these comments in April after attending a Shaping Our Appalachian Region roundtable that focused on substance abuse and intravenous drug use in the region. More than half (56 percent) of the 220 counties identified as most vulnerable for HIV or hepatitis C were located in the Appalachian regions of Kentucky, Tennessee and West Virginia.

"About 25 percent of our state�s population lives in these 54 counties," Hogan said.

The CDC began this study after an unprecedented outbreak of HIV infections occurred in Scott County, Indiana, in 2014 among its intravenous drug users to see what other counties might be vulnerable to such an outbreak.

Researchers looked at all 3,143 U.S. counties and based their rankings on six variables, including: the number of overdose deaths, per-capita-income data, unemployment data, population studies, prescription opioid sales, and prescription sales for opioid treatments such as buprenorphine.

The report points out that this does not mean that HIV or hepatitis C outbreaks are inevitable in these counties, or that there is a current problem with intravenous drug users in these counties, but says that intravenous drug users in these counties are at a higher risk.

One way to slow down the spread of HIV and hepatitis C is through needle exchanges, where intravenous drug users trade dirty needles for clean ones. Needle exchanges were authorized in Kentucky under a 2015 anti-heroin law but also require local approval.

So far, only Louisville and Lexington and the counties of Boyd, Carter, Clark, Elliott, Franklin, Grant, Harrison, Jessamine, Kenton, Knox, Pendleton and Pike are either operating or have approved such programs. Of the 54 high-risk counties, only Boyd, Carter, Clark, Knox and Pike counties have operating needle exchanges.

Hogan said, "The Kentucky Department for Public Health is working closely with (the) CDC and at-risk communities to increase HIV and hepatitis C testing, and is assisting counties in their processes of establishing syringe exchange programs."

Here's a list of Kentucky counties and their national rankings for vulnerability to the rapid spread of HIV and hepatitis C among people who inject drugs: Wolfe, 1st; Breathitt, 3rd; Perry, 4th; Clay, 5th; Bell, 6th; Leslie, 8th; Knox, 9th; Floyd, 10th: Clinton, 11th; Owsley, 12th; Whitley, 14th; Powell, 15th; Knott, 17th; Pike, 21st; Magoffin, 23rd; Estill, 25th; Lee, 30th; Menifee, 31st; Martin, 34th; Boyle, 35th; Lawrence, 39th; Rockcastle, 40th; Harlan, 45th; McCreary, 48th; Letcher, 50th; Johnson, 53rd; Russell, 54th; Elliott, 56th; Laurel, 65th; Carroll, 67th; Taylor, 75th; Grant, 77th; Adair, 93rd; Lincoln, 97th; Wayne, 99th; Cumberland, 101st; Gallatin, 108th; Bath, 125th; Grayson, 126th; Greenup, 129th; Green, 132d; Casey, 153d; Carter, 154th; Monroe, 163d; Garrard, 167th; Robertson, 175th; Lewis, 178th; Edmonson, 179th; Allen, 180th; Boyd, 187th; Hickman, 191st; Breckinridge, 202d; Campbell, 212th; and Mercer, 214th.

Princess Health and Women in small-town America aren't living as long as before; alcohol, drugs, food, housing, jobs, education, pollution to blame. Princessiccia

Princess Health and Women in small-town America aren't living as long as before; alcohol, drugs, food, housing, jobs, education, pollution to blame. Princessiccia

addiction drug abuse drug treatment drug use drugs federal spending life expectancy women women's health

Gusty 08:02 Add Comment

By Trudy Lieberman
Rural Health News Service

Those of us who grew up in small rural communities in the 1950s and '60s expected to have longer life spans than our parents.

The trends were in our favor. White women born in 1900 could expect to live, on average, just shy of 49 years; white men 46.6 years. Those were our grandparents and our neighbors. By 1950, life expectancy had climbed to 72 years for white women born that year and 66.5 for white men. By 2000, life expectancy was still increasing, with female babies expected to live to nearly 80 and males to almost 75.

America was on the rise, jobs were plentiful, antibiotics kept us from dying of strep throat, and polio vaccine kept us out of the iron lung. We thought things would only keep getting better. So I was dismayed to read a story in The Washington Post in April that blew holes in those childhood expectations.

The Post found �white women have been dying prematurely at higher rates since the turn of this century, passing away in their 30s, 40s, and 50s in a slow-motion crisis driven by decaying health in small town-America.�

That �small town America� was where I grew up. I contrasted the Post�s findings to the claims made by all those politicians who have told us we have the best health care in the world and who point to gobs of money lavished on the National Institutes of Health to find new cures and to hospitals promoting their latest imaging machines.

The Post found that since 2000, the health of all white women has declined, but the trend is most pronounced in rural areas. In 2000, for every 100,000 women in their late 40s living in rural areas, 228 died. Today it�s 296.

If the U.S. really has the best healthcare, why are women dying in their prime, reversing the gains we�ve made since I was a kid? After all, mortality rates are a key measure of the health of a nation�s population.

Post reporters found, however, that those dismal stats probably have less to do with health care � which we like to define today as the latest and greatest technology and insurance coverage albeit with high deductibles � and more to do with what health experts call �the social determinants of health,� such basics as food, housing, employment, air quality, and education.

Landmark studies examining the health of British civil servants who all had access to health insurance under Britain�s National Health Service have found over the years that those at the lowest job levels had worse health outcomes. Some of those outcomes were related to things like work climate and social influences outside work like stress and job uncertainty.

In its analysis, the Post found that the benefits of health interventions that increase longevity, things like taking drugs to lower cholesterol and the risk of heart disease, are being overwhelmed by increased opioid use, heavy drinking, smoking and obesity.

Some researchers have speculated that such destructive health behaviors may stem from people�s struggles to find jobs in small communities and the �dashed expectations� hypothesis. White people today are more pessimistic about their opportunities to advance in life than their parents and grandparents were. They are also more pessimistic than their black and Hispanic contemporaries.

A 42-year-old Bakersfield, California, woman who was addicted to painkillers for a decade explained it this way: �This can be a very stifling place. It�s culturally barren,� she said. There is no place where children can go and see what it�s like to be somewhere else, to be someone else. At first, the drugs are an escape from your problems, from this place, and then you�re trapped,� she told Post reporters.

I recently heard U.S. Surgeon General Dr. Vivek Murthy talk about his upcoming report on substance use. About 2.2 million people need help, he said, but only about one million are actually getting it. Murthy wants his report to have consequences as far reaching as the 1964 surgeon general�s report linking tobacco use to lung cancer. In 1964, Murthy noted, 42 percent of Americans smoked; today fewer than 17 percent do.

The Post story concludes that the lethal habits responsible for increasing mortality rates are cresting in small cities where the biggest manufacturer has moved overseas or in families broken by divorce or substance abuse or in the mind and body of someone doing poorly and just barely hanging on.

The Surgeon General has taken on an enormous task, but his efforts just might help the nation move its life expectancy trends back in the right direction.

What do you think is causing poor health in your community? Write to Trudy at trudy.lieberman@gmail.com.

Rural Health News Service is funded by a grant from The Commonwealth Fund and distributed by the Nebraska Press Association.

Princess Health and Half again as many Kentucky newborns were hospitalized for drug dependency last year as the year before.Princessiccia

Princess Health and Half again as many Kentucky newborns were hospitalized for drug dependency last year as the year before.Princessiccia

drug abuse drug treatment drug use drugs hospitals infant health narcotics neonatal care pain

Gusty 07:59 Add Comment

Mother Samantha Adams and her newborn Leopoldo Bautista,
10 days old, spend quality time inside the Louisville Norton
Healthcare child care center for children experiencing drug
withdrawal. (Photo by Alton Strupp, The Courier-Journal)

Increasing drug abuse drove up hospitalizations of drug-dependent newborns in Kentucky by 48 percent last year, to 1,409 from 955 in 2013. "The latest numbers represent a 50-fold increase from only 28 hospitalizations in 2000," reports Laura Ungar of The Courier-Journal.

"The seemingly never-ending increase every year is so frustrating to see," Van Ingram, executive director of the state Office of Drug Control Policy, told Ungar. "It's a horrible thing to spend the first days of your life in agony."

"These infants are born into suffering," Ungar writes. "They cry piercingly and often. They suffer vomiting, diarrhea, feeding difficulties, low-grade fevers, seizures � and even respiratory distress if they're born prematurely."

Drug-dependent newborns are becoming more common nationwide, Ungar notes, but "Vanderbilt University researchers publishing in the Journal of Perinatology [a subspecialty of obstetrics concerned with the care of the fetus and complicated, high-risk pregnancies] say rates are highest in a region encompassing Tennessee, Mississippi, Alabama and Kentucky."

While the increase is blamed mostly on illegal drug use, the Vanderbilt study found that 28 percent of pregnant Medicaid recipients in Tennessee filled at least one painkiller prescription, Ungar writes: "Legitimate use not only raises the risk of having a drug-dependent baby, it can sometimes lead to abuse and addiction."

While Medicaid now pays for behavioral-health and substance-abuse treatment, "Drug treatment for pregnant women is sorely lacking," Ungar reports. In Kentucky, only 71 of the 286 treatment facilities listed by the U.S. Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration treat pregnant women. 

Princess Health andKentucky led the nation in hepatitis C cases in 2013; state's rate rose 357 percent from 2007 to 2011.Princessiccia

Princess Health andKentucky led the nation in hepatitis C cases in 2013; state's rate rose 357 percent from 2007 to 2011.Princessiccia

Appalachia diseases drug abuse drug use drugs health hepatitis c prescription drug abuse rural health rural-urban disparities

Gusty 08:18 Add Comment

By Tim Mandell
Kentucky Health News

Kentucky had the nation's highest rate of hepatitis C in 2013, with 5.1 cases per every 100,000 people, says a report by the federal Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. As many as 3.5 million people in the U.S. have hepatitis C and more than 56,000 Kentucky resident may have chronic hepatitis C infection, according to the state Cabinet for Health and Family Services. The main cause of hepatitis C is shared needles among intravenous drug users.

Hepatitis C cases rose 364 percent in Kentucky, Tennessee, Virginia and West Virginia from 2006 to 2012. The big increase was in 2007-11, when the rate rose 357 percent, a CDC state health profile says.

"Of the cases that have been reported and researchers gathered data about potential risk factors, 73.1 percent reported injecting drugs," Brian Wu reports for Science Times. Among new cases, 44.8 percent were people under 30.

While officials said HIV rates are low in the four Appalachian states, they said they fear that the increase in hepatitis C cases could lead to a rise in HIV cases, Wu writes. Officials said needle-exchange programs are key to reduce the number of potential HIV cases. Kentucky recently authorized such programs if local officials agree to them.

"About 4.5 million Americans older than 12 abused prescription painkillers in 2013 and 289,000 used heroin, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration," Liz Szabo reports for USA Today. "About 75 percent of new heroin users previously abused opioid painkillers. The number of first-time heroin users grew from 90,000 people in 2006 to 156,000 in 2012, according to the CDC."

Kentucky has the third highest drug overdose mortality rate in the U.S., with 23.6 deaths per 100,000 people, says the 2013 report "Prescription Drug Abuse: Strategies to Stop the Epidemic," reports Trust for America's Health. "The number of drug overdose deaths�a majority of which are from prescription drugs�in Kentucky quadrupled since 1999 when the rate was 4.9 per 100,000."

Princess Health andPolling shows Kentucky ranks third in share of residents, 24.5 percent, who say they take mood-altering drugs every day.Princessiccia

Princess Health andPolling shows Kentucky ranks third in share of residents, 24.5 percent, who say they take mood-altering drugs every day.Princessiccia

alcohol alcohol abuse drug abuse drug use drugs prescription drug abuse prescription drugs tobacco

Gusty 08:59 Add Comment

Kentucky is the place to be for mood-altering drugs. The state ranked third in a Gallup Organization study that asked 450 adults in each state how often they use drugs and medications to affect their mood or relax them, Christopher Ingraham reports for The Washington Post. West Virginia led, with 28.1 percent of respondents saying they use mood-altering drugs every day, Rhode Island was second at 25.9 percent, but Kentucky was not far behind at 24.5 percent.

Nationally, 18.9 percent of respondents said they take drugs almost every day, while 62.2 percent said they never do, 13.1 percent said they rarely do and 5 percent said they sometimes do.

The way the question was worded allows for errors, Ingraham writes. The question asked about drugs and medications, but didn't specify which ones, and didn't mention alcohol or tobacco. That left interpretation of the question up to individual respondents.

A recent National Survey of Drug Use and Health said that at least 71 percent of American adults drank in the past year, and 56 percent drank in the past month, which if true, could raise the rates in most states, if respondents were to consider alcohol a mood-altering drug. (Read more) (To view this interactive Post map click here)