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Welcome to "Connections," the podcast that bridges the gap between addiction and mental health through the prism of policy and practice. Join the hosts, Morgan Coyner and Sarah Howe, as they unravel the intricate connections within the world of addiction. In each episode, they dive deep into the intersection of prevention and recovery.
Full Episode Becca 1
[00:00:00] Welcome to Connections, the podcast from addiction professionals of North Carolina, where we explore the nuances of addiction and mental health through the lens of policy and practice. We're your hosts, Morgan Koiner and Sarah Howe, and we're here to help you see how it all connects. Today on the podcast, we have Becca Sweeting, who is the Information Referral and Data Team Lead at the Alcohol Drug Council of North Carolina.
Becca, thank you for joining us. Thank you for having me. Of course, yes. So, um, before we get into sort of, um, the main part of our conversation today, can you just tell our listeners, like, who ABC& C is and what service you provide to our state? Thank you. [00:01:00] Sure. So, Alcohol Drug Council of North Carolina is an organization, um, where we Aimed to help people recover from, um, substance use and mental health conditions.
We have a call center where people can call in to learn about and find providers and other treatment resources for substance use and mental health. Um, we try to advocate, um, and just kind of try to fight stigma. That's what we do as an organization. Awesome. That call center. Um, really quickly, will you just tell us the phone number?
I wanna make sure we get it in. Yes. And don't forget, tell us that phone number because if anybody listening needs to write it down or know someone who, who could use it, I wanna make sure that we get that out there. So tell us who they will call, um, to, to get some help. Sure. You can call 1-800-688-FOUR 2 3 2.
Awesome. And you have an [00:02:00] incredible team of people answering those phone calls and. the fielding those requests. Um, in our conversation today, what I really want to talk about is some of the information you're able to gather from those calls. Y'all really sit at the center of this crisis in our state because you day in and day out are talking to the individuals who actually are in that pivotal crisis moment.
Where they are ready to make that decision to get help. And, um, that is a really special place to be. And so I just want to hear from you kind of like, what trends are you seeing in our state through those phone calls that you're receiving? Yeah, sure. So, um. In this last fiscal year, we received over almost 11, 000 calls, um, and, and through all of those calls, um, alcohol and opiates were always in the top, um, the top three areas of substance use that we, that we, um, [00:03:00] hear about from our callers, um, and then cocaine and methamphetamines have been in Coming, um, more and more into play, um, as well over the last year or so, um, other trends are our main age group that we hear from is between the ages of 26 and 34, um, less than 2 percent of our callers are, um.
Under the age of 18, but that doesn't mean there's not a need for treatment for more treatment providers for those callers, of course, because there is a huge need. 51 percent of people call for themselves and 49 percent of people are calling for a loved one, which I find Very interesting. Um, it hasn't always been that, that 50 50, um, percentage range.
It's usually been where people are calling, you know, for themselves, um, more so than the alternative. Yeah. So when you're talking about... Calling for yourself or calling for a loved one [00:04:00] and the statistics that you were mentioning earlier Like eight, you know the 18 and under that you're seeing our calls Are you do you mean eight they're asking about services for 18 and under so in the entirety of that hundred percent?
Or are you saying it's 18 and under that aren't calling for themselves? That makes sense
So Can you repeat the question? Sure, I guess what I'm trying to tease out is in the numbers, in what you're tracking, when you're saying you're getting, your biggest call is like that 26, what, to 37 age, does that mean those are the actual people calling or they're calling about services for age 26 to 37?
Um, it just kind of depends on the caller. I couldn't tell you how many of the people between 26 and 34 are calling for themselves or for someone else. So it's what they're looking for. They're looking for service, whether [00:05:00] it's for themselves or someone else, the age that you are seeing of people needing services in this state, the biggest bulk that you're getting calls about.
Like you said, I think you're right. That doesn't mean there's not a need under, but it's that really that middle. What it's not really middle age. It's the early middle age. Yeah, it's right. 26 is young. Yeah Yeah, you know and I remember when I first got into recovery like people told me I was so lucky because I was starting so young and it took them so many years to get there And so it's actually really exciting to me to hear that that's one of the the more common calls because you know if you enter recovery at 26 you could have 50, 60 years of recovery where when you get into recovery at 65, you, and, and it, it's interesting, you know, just to see that trend of, of younger people wanting to, to get healthy.
Yep. Yep. So in that age, that, that big bulk that you're seeing, what's their highest trend? What a, what a drug of choice are they asking [00:06:00] about? Is it still that alcohol and opiates? It's, it's opiates and opioids. So we've got, when I say opiates and opioids, I'm kind of grouping everything together. I'm grouping methadone, heroin, fentanyl.
As well as RX opioids together. Okay. Um, the highest of those four categories, though, is fentanyl. And for that age group, it's, um, I don't, I can't say whether or not it's fentanyl or heroin, but it's definitely within the opiates and opioids category. using fentanyl, not like, I was using a different substance and it was laced with fentanyl.
It's not. That's people who are actively using fentanyl. Yes. That's a really good distinction. And it's really scary. Yeah. I mean. Yeah. There is a lot of fear and a lot of misinformation about fentanyl of like, oh, if you touch it, it'll kill you and and things like that. Like, there are people who actively use it and yet, it is also actively killing.
Mm hmm. Hundreds of thousands of people. Mm hmm. In our, [00:07:00] well, not that many in our state but right in our state and in our country. Mm hmm. Um it's scary that that's a substance that people are able to find and get access to. Yep. Yeah. Yep. So then my next question going down that road is getting people help.
Where are some of the biggest gaps, where you're having the biggest challenge connecting them to the resources? Yeah, for sure. Um, so women without, there are a lot of programs for women and children, which is excellent. And again, we need even more. But women without children is a huge gap. Um, there are a lot of, of faith based programs.
There are a lot of different work programs that, um, women without children can go to. But as far as finding programs with a clinical setting, um, that's on an inpatient or residential, um, Uh, treatment provider. Sorry. That is a huge area where we have a hard time [00:08:00] finding programs. Um, you know, faith based programs and work programs, they're amazing and they save a lot of lives, but they're just not for everyone.
So. You know, that's a, that's a pretty big gap. Um, we've got people with medical needs. That's another huge gap. People that are on dialysis, people that are on oxygen, people that, um, are type 1 diabetic and have to use, have to inject insulin on a daily basis. Um, a lot of programs won't take people with conditions like these.
And that's, um, That's a huge gap too. And it's, it's tough to know where to point the right direction to point in. Definitely. Um, if you could tell us also, um, and we can put some of this in the show notes, but. For anyone listening to this is like, Hey, my program does that and I want to make sure that I'm on your list because if you're having trouble placing people and my census is low, I want to make sure we're vibing.
So how, how can people get listed? And do you have a [00:09:00] database? Like, how do you organize all this information? Um, there's tons of providers doing work in this state. Um, how, how are you able to, yeah. So we do, we have, we do, we have a database, um, and we actually just created an external, um, tool called the Resource Directory.
And that is a way that people can actually visit, create their own account, and then submit their information for their agency directly to our website. And then all's I have to do is go in, check it, and then, um, Approve it and then it'll be in our database and on our external facing resource directory.
So that's one way Another way is to um, call me and I can walk them through the steps of getting into the resource directory I I can give a direct phone number if you'd like to get in touch with me Yeah
[00:10:00] Yeah, sure. So, my email address is rsweedingatalcoholdrughelp. org. And we'll put that in the show notes so you don't need to spell it out or anything. We'll, we'll make sure that they can, they can access that. I just want to make sure, like, you, right, the podcast is called Connections. Like, as many people as we can connect back to you, to make sure that you can then connect folks to those services, um, is really important to us.
You know, like, it's a huge resource for... For our state to be able to have one number that they can call and say, I need help and have someone on the other end say, great, like, I have some options for you. I think it's helpful to give our listeners that aren't in this field. I mean, we hope we're really actually reaching those people that are not in this field, but want to know more about the work that we do.
When they call you, you're able to provide a referral source. But let me make sure I'm correct about this. Are you, you're not doing an actual assessment. [00:11:00] You're sending them to a potential provider that will do that clinical assessment for that level of care. Am I correct in that? That's correct. What we're doing is a brief screening.
So we're asking just a few questions, um, to get an idea of, of where to send the person, um, the best places to send the person to, um, through that screen. What kind of questions might they expect if they're calling? Um, yeah, sure. So what they're using. Um, we ask how they're using it. So the route, how often they're using it.
We ask their age. We do ask for zip code. Um, a lot of, um, state funded providers require that you live within a certain cashman area in North Carolina to be able to go to their facility at no cost. to you, um, the patient. Um, so that's why we ask for the zip code. Um, but we do have the ability to look through the entire state.
We ask, um, whether or not they've served in the military because there are different resources. We ask if they're pregnant or if they have children because there are different resources. [00:12:00] Um, So we ask questions like that just to get a basic idea. Um, we definitely don't want to just send people to 15 phone numbers that are going to send them to 15 more phone numbers that are going to send them to one provider that might be able to help.
We want to eliminate that. So that's kind of why we go through that screening and they can be anonymous, right? Absolutely. And if, if somebody doesn't want to answer any of the questions, they don't have to. Our main goal, of course, we want to gather information. And so we can kind of study what's going on in North Carolina.
But if the person isn't isn't comfortable answering certain questions, we're not going to force them. We're still going to help in the best way that we can. That's our main goal.So our website is alcoholdrughelp. org, uh, you can search for resources by clicking on the resource button and you'll, you'll be able to see, um, there's a button for providers where they can enter their information and then there's a button for people seeking resources and they can click on that and go from there.
It's, it's pretty simple. You enter your zip code and it gives you a list of programs in that area. Um, there's other search criteria, of course, as well that you can enter. Dot com. Dot org. Org. Lemme say that. Got it. So we have it. Right's alcohol drug help.org. And then that phone number. One more time.
[00:15:00] 1-800-688-4232. Great. Awesome. Well, Becca, I just wanna say thank you for, for joining us and um, I hope that we can kind of continue this conversation 'cause I know you continue getting calls. You probably got people answering calls right now and Mm-Hmm. , you know, as we continue to see. pop up in North Carolina.
We would love to continue having you just come tell us what you're seeing and so that we can keep sure to date. And, um, y'all really are such a great resource and we want to just keep supporting you. So thank you so much for being here with us today. And we, um, like I said, we'll, we'll keep this conversation going for sure.
Thank you both so much. I appreciate you. Thanks for the work that you're doing. It's an important problem. We're we're in it together. We're glad to have you.