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About 61 percent of Virginians say heroin addicts should be provided treatment in lieu of arrest and jail time, according to results of a Virginia Commonwealth University poll released Jan. 17. About 72 percent of respondents favor similar treatment of prescription drug abusers.
The results are from The 2017 Public Policy Poll, Public Safety, Substance Use and Mental Health, from VCU’s Center for Public Policy at the L. Douglas Wilder School of Government and Public Affairs.
Responsibility in combating heroin abuse should begin with the addict, according to 30 percent of poll participants. Nineteen percent placed responsibility with state or local government, 17 percent said it should be up to law enforcement, and 15 percent cited family and friends.
But when it comes to prescription drug abuse, about 44 percent of those polled say it should be the prescribing doctors’ responsibility to combat the problem. A quarter place responsibility on the drug abusers.
Support for treatment reflected respondents' political leanings, with 38 percent of democrats and an equal percentage of independents favoring treatment options for heroin addicts, a stance supported by 18 percent of self-identified republicans.
Dr. Samuel Hughes Melton, chief deputy commissioner of health for the Virginia Department of Health, said in a Jan. 19 phone interview that the public support of treatment for addicts is understandable: Anybody who has had close contact with an addict understands that addiction is not a choice, it's a disease. And because people are connected and it affects relationships, a lot of people have firsthand or secondhand experiences in dealing with addictions.
Melton draws a comparison of current perceptions regarding addiction with how society dealt with depression 30 years ago, a time when there was a stigma attached to those seeking treatment and dealing with the disease. With addiction, an inaccurate understanding of the disease leads to public positions and opinions that are unhelpful in optimal treatment.
The VCU survey was conducted Dec. 1-20, with 1,000 participants. The margin of error is 4.1 percent.
Is There a Top Doc in the House?
Voting is underway for the 2017 edition of Richmond magazine's annual Top Docs survey. Invitations have been sent via snail mail and email to more than 5,000 medical professionals. Their task: to share which physicians in various specialties they would recommend to a family member or close friend.
We've added a new category this year, nurse practitioners, and opened voting to nurse practitioners as well. We're also awarding special honors this year in the following categories: lab technician, teen volunteer, patient advocate/care manager, medical office/front desk worker, midwife/nurse midwife and surgical assistant. We're asking survey respondents to share their thoughts on the type of medical care reform they'd like to see from the federal government.
If you're a physician, nurse practitioner, optometrist, psychologist or chiropractor in metro Richmond and didn't as yet get an invitation to complete the survey, contact Lifestyle Editor Tharon Giddens for information on how to participate. The voting continues through midnight on Feb. 13, and winners will be listed in the April issue. Check out last year's list of Top Docs.
HEALTHY DEVELOPMENTS
A roundup of the week's medicine and health news
- Richmond-based PrecisePortions.com, a business that offers nutrition and dieting products that promote healthier eating, now has its wares available at Wegmans grocers. Learn more about the business here.
- The mind-body connection in health and healing is the topic of a discussion, "The Physician Within: Mental Power Over Health," to be presented from 6 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. on Wednesday, Feb. 15, at First Baptist Church, 2709 Monument Ave. Panelists are James P. McCullough, a professor of clinical psychology at VCU; orthopedic surgeon Terry L. Whipple; and neurologist Alan E. Schulman. The free session will focus on how mental and emotional states affect illness and injury. Call 355-8637 or email info@fbrichmond.org for more information.
- Temps just sound colder when cited in Celsius, so let's say that as of Monday, the water was at 10 degrees in the James River at Cartersville (the closest available station that reports water temperature). That's about 49 degrees Fahrenheit to us Celsius-challenged folk, and still plenty cold, but that shouldn't faze the brave souls set to take the plunge into the river on Saturday in Richmond at the third Shiver in the River fundraiser for Keep Virginia Beautiful. The event also features a 5K walk/run, a riverbank cleanup, food, adult beverages and music. It's free to help keep the river clean, but it costs $25 to participate in the 5K, and you or your team need to raise at least $75 to jump in the river at Historic Tredegar.
- Richmond-based Kaleo Pharma has set a Feb. 14 date to reintroduce to the market Auvi-Q, an auto-injection device to deliver a single dose of epinephrine (adrenaline), the drug of choice to treat a severe allergic reaction. The company also announced a program called Auvi-Q AffordAbility, which it says will make the product available for no out-of-pocket costs to Americans with commercial insurance, and free to those without government or commercial insurance and a household income of less than $100,000. The cash price will be $360. Learn more about the company and the product here and here.
- A $3.1 million grant will be used by the Virginia Department of Health Professions to link the state's Prescription Monitoring Program with the electronic health records used by doctors and pharmacies, according to a release. The grant is from Purdue Pharma. “The Prescription Monitoring Program is a critical prevention tool that helps curb abuse of prescription medications, and I applaud this enhancement that makes the PMP easier and more likely for physicians to use,” Gov. Terry McAuliffe says in the release.
- Abnormal heart rhythms are the focus of the Arrhythmia Center that recently opened at the Bon Secours Heart and Vascular Institute. The program is at St. Francis Medical Center, 13700 St. Francis, Blvd., and in Mechanicsville at Memorial Regional Medical Center, 8243 Meadowbridge Road. The center is led by cardiac electrophysiologists Harpreet Grewal and Omar Shams, according to a release. the most common form of abnormal heart rhythm is atrial fibrillation, which affects about 3.4 million Americans.
