Ohio is one of the hardest-hit states in the United States when it comes to opioid overdose deaths. Confronted with over 4,000 opioid overdose deaths in 2017, the Ohio Department of Mental Health and Addiction Services launched the Community Collective Impact Model for Change (CCIM4C) initiative to encourage 12 Ohio counties to think more deeply about primary prevention. By moving upstream and taking a look at the causes of the opioid crisis, the counties involved in the CCIM4C initiative were able to expand the range of potential partners and potential solutions, moving from emergency response alone to broader efforts to support social connection, economic security, and other social determinants of health. Each county brought together a wide array of partners, including local employers, community colleges, health care organizations, faith leaders, youth-serving organizations, first responders, librarians, school board members, public health officials, parks and recreation staff, and people with lived experience. This article focuses on the efforts of three counties—Ashtabula, Lorain, and Lawrence—to take on the community conditions that increase the risk of unhealthy substance use and addiction. It describes what they learned as they went beyond a sole focus on preventing opioid overdoses and deaths—as critically important as that is—to transforming their communities to support health and well-being in the first place.
Any strategy to end the opioid epidemic must include recognizing and addressing the role of widespread individual and community trauma and the need for solutions that build protective factors and agency within communities while supporting long-term treatment and recovery for those experiencing substance use disorders. In this chapter, the authors describe how a community trauma–informed approach can be applied to address and mitigate the exposures, behaviors, and high levels of hopelessness that are fueling the opioid crisis. Further, the chapter explores how primary prevention strategies can complement opioid treatment and long-term recovery interventions and address other conditions that co-occur in communities experiencing trauma.
scite is a Brooklyn-based organization that helps researchers better discover and understand research articles through Smart Citations–citations that display the context of the citation and describe whether the article provides supporting or contrasting evidence. scite is used by students and researchers from around the world and is funded in part by the National Science Foundation and the National Institute on Drug Abuse of the National Institutes of Health.
customersupport@researchsolutions.com
10624 S. Eastern Ave., Ste. A-614
Henderson, NV 89052, USA
This site is protected by reCAPTCHA and the Google Privacy Policy and Terms of Service apply.
Copyright © 2024 scite LLC. All rights reserved.
Made with 💙 for researchers
Part of the Research Solutions Family.