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Recovery in the News
People with addictions can find recovery, hope
Jane Pressly
GreenvilleOnline.com
October 9, 2008
Arecent column in The Greenville News by Dr. Ed Leap, titled "God so loved the world, including alcoholics," was read with interest by the board and membership of FAVOR Greenville as we prepared to celebrate National Alcohol and Drug Addiction Recovery Month in September.
As one of the five chapters of FAVOR SC, Faces and Voices of Recovery (FAVOR) Greenville promotes long-term recovery from addiction through education, advocacy and recovery-support services resulting in healthier individuals, families and communities.
Dr. Leap's column painted a clear picture of the frustration and hopelessness that is experienced during an emergency room visit by health-care providers, families and -- most importantly -- the very people who are suffering with substance use disorders.
Managing intoxicated people in the emergency room with acute interventions is difficult but important work in order to keep the suffering person alive and reduce harm to them and others. But this acute care is not an effective treatment for addiction and will rarely have an impact on the remission of the illness, as Dr. Leap knows firsthand. In his work in the emergency room, Dr. Leap only gets to see active addiction and not the miracle of recovery from addiction that members of FAVOR Greenville see and live.
In the example described in Dr. Leap's column, the best-case scenario would be for the person to be transported at discharge from the emergency room to a residential treatment center for an initial and ongoing assessment; the development of a recovery plan; and participation in evidence-based treatment practices that help establish and sustain long-term recovery. Research demonstrates that substance use disorders are just as treatable as other chronic conditions such as diabetes, asthma and hypertension, with similar reoccurrence rates.
In the Upstate, we do not have such residential treatment on demand; nor does most health insurance cover the appropriate level of treatment of addiction as a chronic illness. So the person continues to drink or use drugs and returns to the emergency room once again.
These very problems are why FAVOR Greenville was established in 2004. In addition to putting a face and voice on recovery by being public with our recovery from addiction to help reduce stigma and discrimination, we are advocating for a residential treatment program at Allen Bennett Hospital in Greer, which could be a hub for referrals from all the hospital emergency rooms in the Upstate.
We are working to establish a Recovery Action Center to be a bridge between treatment providers and the recovering community and to offer recovery support services for those in early recovery or seeking recovery.
We are advocating on the national level for parity in health insurance coverage so that treatment of addiction is covered on par with other chronic illnesses.
We are also working to establish SBIRT (Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment) as the best practice standard in all health care settings, so that more people can be helped before their harmful use of alcohol or drugs progresses to addiction.
And we also celebrate recovery each year with a Rally for Recovery concert, which was held on Sept. 13 this year. More than 1,000 recovering people, their family members, friends, area treatment providers and mutual support groups came together at the DowBrands Amphitheatre to hear Livingston Taylor, a singer/songwriter in long-term recovery. It was an absolutely perfect moonlit evening, with no shame for those in recovery, but with joy for being clean and sober and full of hope for the future.
FAVOR Greenville thanks health-care providers like Dr. Leap who care for us when our addictions are at their worst. We want them and the whole community to know that we do find recovery from addiction and get well. We are living proof.