Peter Schorsch
With National Patient Safety Awareness Week just around the corner, Tampa General Hospital is focused on the growing opioid epidemic in Florida and throughout the nation and what resources are available to support patients struggling with opioid addiction.
This week, TGH community brought leaders together at the Straz Center for a series of discussions on how opioids are affecting residents in the Tampa Bay region. The speakers and panelists highlighted the resources available for health providers to direct patients who are in need of help.
“The opioid crisis — along with mental health issues in our community and across the country — is a very big issue for all of us. We at Tampa General are hosting this forum tonight in honor of National Patient Safety Week,” TGH President and CEO John Couris said.
“Between 2016 and 2017, emergency departments across Florida saw an 18% increase in visits related to opioids. The numbers continue to rise. That is why we must come together to dig deeper to stop this epidemic.”
During the event, Tampa Mayor Jane Castor thanked first responders for their efforts to combat the crisis. As a former Tampa Chief of Police, Castor knows first-hand the risks first responders face in situations involving opioids.
“This is such an important issue because we are losing so many individuals from all walks of life. Addiction does not know any boundaries,” she said. “And so, it’s something that we all have to work together to address. Thank you to Tampa General Hospital for putting this on tonight.”
Hillsborough County Sheriff Chad Chronister, Pasco County Sheriff Chris Nocco, Tampa Police Department Chief Brian Dugan, West Central Florida Mental Wellness Coalition CEO Carrie Zeisse, DACCO Behavioral Health CEO Mary Lynn Ulrey and BayCare Behavioral Health Vice President Gail Ryder also participated in the community program.
More than 5.5 billion prescription pain pills were distributed in Florida from 2006 to 2012, according to data compiled by the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. Data also shows there were nearly 6,000 drug-related deaths in in the state, of which nearly half were related to opioid use.
In the last two years, TGH has taken a number of steps to proactively reduce opioid use and thus reduce opioid abuse. Measures include:
— Improving procedures to decrease the number of infants who required pharmacological management because of in-utero drug exposure;
— Partnering with the drug treatment organizations ACTS and DACCO to help identify patients in TGH’s Emergency Room who would be appropriate for drug treatment services.
— Publishing national guidelines on the acute management of musculoskeletal pain.
— Using anesthesiology techniques which in many cases allow patients to receive opioid-free or opioid-sparing operations.
Last June, First Lady Casey DeSantis visited TGH to host a roundtable on mental health and substance abuse issues, during which experts at TGH shared their experiences and solutions to reduce opioid use and abuse.
This week’s event — bringing together community leaders, law enforcement and health care providers — was the latest in this series of actions TGH has taken to reduce opioid use, get help to those who need it and reverse the growing epidemic.
“Our strategies have changed … The opioid and the mental health epidemic that we are facing now, most of the time they are codependent,” Chronister said during the panel discussion at the Straz Center. “We knew we had to do something different. So, we’ve expanded our resources to get them additional drug treatment, mental health treatment.”
While the opioid epidemic is currently prevalent in Florida, the possibility of a coronavirus pandemic is currently top of mind in this state that welcomes more than 120 million visitors from around the world each year. During the event, Couris addressed the elephant in the room: the CDC’s confirmation of coronavirus in three patients in Florida.
“The opioid epidemic is not the only health crisis happening. We are all staying alert about the coronavirus. Tampa-area health care workers are doing everything in our power to be prepared to tackle this virus. Any residents experiencing symptoms that could be related to coronavirus should call the health department and be assured that they can be treated locally,” Couris said.
“This week I had the opportunity to be with Governor [Ron] DeSantis who declared a health state of emergency in the state of Florida,” Couris continued. “I also met with the mayor and law enforcement yesterday in a panel discussion with the Governor, and I can tell you this state is prepared; the health system is prepared. We will take care of our health care workers first. Because you are the first line of defense and we will walk shoulder to shoulder with you through this. But we will maintain a united front for our community and for our team. And together we are going to work to keep this community safe.”
Tampa General, a 1007-bed nonprofit medical center, performs liver, heart, lung, adult and pediatric kidney and pancreas transplants. In 2018, Tampa General performed its 10,000th transplant, becoming one of a small number of transplant centers nationwide to reach that milestone.
