Helps employers, clergy, others deal with opioid crisis

In response to the continuing opioid crisis in the Tri-State area, Ohio University Southern will have a community workshop.

The training is called Screening, Brief Intervention and Referral to Treatment, or SBIRT, and seeks to provide strategies for appropriate response to individuals impacted by drug abuse.

“One of the things the Southern Campus has been doing is participating in the Lawrence County Recovery Coalition,” said Sarah Diamond Burroway, OUS director of External Relations, Communications and Workforce Success. “And we are, as a campus, looking at ways we can effectively respond to the opioid and other drug crisis in the community.”

Burroway said the training is for anyone who interacts with people that might come into contact with drugs.

“For example, business owners might have employees or customers that might be impacted by illicit drugs. We have interest from the faith-based community on what the appropriate response for a clergy member or church member can make if they encounter someone in need of drug treatment,” Burroway said. “Really, it is a very effective and researched model on a strategy that anyone can use.”

SBIRT takes an evidence-based approach, which promotes universal screening to identify use, early risks, and abuse and appropriate intervention.

Burroway said that she has already gotten responses from people in Kentucky, Portsmouth and the Ironton community.

“Some of these individuals are in the health care sector, the mental health and recovery sector, law enforcement, and education,” Burroway said. “Really, it is hitting so many sides of the community. It is really a workshop that everyone can gain from.”

Registered participants will meet in the Caucus Room of the Academic Center at the Ironton Campus on Sept. 21. The workshop is scheduled from 8:30-11:30 a.m. for the public.

Lyn O’Connell, PhD, IMFT, and clinical coordinator of the MUSBIRT project at Marshall University, is the workshop presenter. A federal Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Grant funded the project.

“We were fortunate to connect with Dr. Lyn O’Connell and she offered her expertise and bringing her grant to Ironton,” Burroway said, adding that the some OUS staff members will also be taking the workshop. “We were glad to open it up for the public.”

The workshop is hosted by the Southern Campus Workforce Success initiative. For more information or to register, please email workforcesuccess@ohio.edu.