April 5, 2020 • 30 mins
Rachael Cooper, Senior Program Manager and Subject Matter Expert - Substance Use Harm Prevention at National Safety Council, joins Chris Martin and Jon O'Brien of the Building PA Podcast to shed light on the ongoing impact of opioids to the Pennsylvania construction industry.
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Episode Transcript
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Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hello, and welcome to the PA construction industry
podcast recorded right here inthe Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania.
I am one of the hosts, DonO'Brien from the Keystone
contractors association.
And this is Chris Martin withAtlas marketing, where we tell
stories for people who buildthings.
(00:21):
Awesome.
Glad you're with us today.
I hope you're ready for anotherepisode here, Chris.
Uh, this is, uh, this is a, thisis a very timely, uh, very, uh,
important, uh, topic for notonly for both of us, but for the
entire industry.
So this is great.
Yeah, absolutely.
Uh, the topic is, uh, somethingvery near and dear to the
(00:44):
construction industry and theKCA members.
So about three and a half yearsago, I was hired by the KCA and
the KCA is located in centralPA.
The headquarters is Harrisburgand I left Pittsburgh and this
was a new membership ofconstruction companies.
And the first thing I wanted todo was really find the strengths
(01:05):
and weaknesses of these membersand get to know more about them
and among challenges.
There was a reoccurring issuethat kept popping up throughout
these construction companiesbased.
And it was, it was the opioidissue and how it is drastically
affecting, you know, their ownworkforce and their communities.
(01:26):
And it's just tearing familiesand communities apart, and the
KCA wanted to do something aboutit.
So I started making a bunch ofcalls and contacts to industry
friends, and everyone said thesame thing.
You got to go to the nationalsafety council, they have the
premier resources.
(01:46):
It's a great educational, uh,outlet for information.
And I'm just thrilled andexcited to have Rachel Cooper
from the national safety councilwith us today to talk about, um,
opioids and, and, uh, yeah, I'mreally excited to welcome to the
show right now.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Thank you guys.
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Yeah.
So as I mentioned, a topic todayis opioid awareness and the
effect on the industry.
Um, can you kind of give usmaybe your background and kind
of lead up to, uh, you know,your involvement in, on this
serious issue?
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Absolutely.
So, thanks again for having me.
My name is Rachel Cooper and Iam the senior program manager
and subject matter expert onopioids for the national safety
council.
My personal background is onethat's based, um, in both
international and public health.
So I started working on theopioid epidemic abroad when I
(02:45):
was living in France severalyears ago, I have moved back to
the States and I have workedboth on the front lines, doing a
lot of programming, gettingpeople into treatment and
getting people to support thatthey need people who have an
opioid use disorder.
And then now I'm working for thenational safety council.
And what we're primarily workingon right now is the intersection
(03:06):
of opioids and how it impactsthe workplace.
So when I say workplace, I mean,both employers and employees.
So that is how our programmingcame to John's ears.
And a lot of what we do rightnow as pertains to opioid
awareness is really aboutrealizing that this is an issue
(03:27):
that we can all impact.
This is something that we canall learn about that we can all
change.
The opioid crisis is complex,and it has many different faces
and many different storylines,and it impacts us all
differently, but we can supportourselves and help ourselves and
help our neighbors and ourcommunities and our colleagues
and our coworkers by learningmore about the issue and really
(03:50):
increasing the education andawareness about the issue.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Great.
Great to have you on the showhere and on behalf of the KCA
membership, thank you for allthe resources you guys have
supplied us.
The NCSS supplied us.
Um, they've been extremelyhelpful for the employers.
Um, you know, we get thestickers on the insurance and,
um, medication cards.
That's, that's been awesome.
It's been chronicled in mediaoutlets.
(04:16):
Um, any, any other, uh, well, ofcourse you got the resource
guide just came out.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Let me give a, I can talk alittle bit about the things that
you know that we've, we've putout.
So the stickers that youmentioned, just to clarify,
those are the warn me labels inwarn me labels are intended for
anybody who uses a pharmacy,right?
So anybody who receives aprescription, which is most of
us, one thing that we know isthat oftentimes when you're
(04:44):
prescribed a medication, you'renot exactly sure what it is,
right?
You might be prescribedsomething and it doesn't sound
like something you've heard of.
We know that that's also verytrue with opioids.
A lot of us are very familiarwith say oxycodone or Percocet
or Vicodin.
Those names are very familiar topeople, but there's ones that
are equally unfamiliar, such asTramadol.
(05:06):
Tramadol is also an opioid forexample, or some of the generic
names that we might notrecognize as an opioid, what a
warning label does is it, youstick it on your own pharmacy
loyalty card or your insurancecard or whatever.
And it says, opioids warn me.
And it's a reminder to yourselfto ask your doctor for
questions, which are provided toyou about, you know, am I being
(05:29):
prescribed an opioid?
Um, is there an alternative, ifthere isn't an alternative, how
can I take this safely, etcetera, et cetera.
And it's a reminder, not onlyfor you, but when you present
your pharmacy card to yourpharmacist, it's a reminder for
them as well.
So this is one of those toolsthat we thought was really
useful in the workplace.
And there's a lot, like yousaid, it's been published in the
(05:51):
media because we give them outin little cards of four.
So not only do you put it onyour own pharmacy card, you can
take it home for your family, oryou can pass it to friends and
they are free and can be ordered, um, on our website at
nsc.org/take action.
So that's one of the reallyconcrete tools that we've put
out the second tool.
And this is really aboutengaging businesses and
(06:14):
understanding the impact thatthe opioid crisis has had on the
workplace is our substance usecost calculator and the
substance use cost calculatortakes your organization's size
it's industry and the state thatyou're in and uses a variety of
sources to debt of data, tocalculate the financial impact
(06:36):
that the opioid crisis has hadon your workplace from turnover
to absenteeism, to increasehealth care costs, to workers'
compensation costs.
This tool pulls together all ofthat information so that you can
see the cost of substance use,not just opioids, but also
including alcohol cannabis, etcetera, is having on your
(06:56):
workplace.
It also shows you how much moneyyou can save by supporting
employees through recovery.
The third tool that was justmentioned is the NSC opioids at
work employer tool kit, and theemployer toolkit is a set of
resources targeted at four mainaudiences, HR professionals,
(07:18):
safety professionals, managers,and supervisors, and employees
themselves.
We came to the conclusion afterserving, um, several hundred
organizations across the countrythat all four of those groups
are necessary to create acomprehensive program to address
opioids in the workplace.
Opioids have a safety impact.
(07:39):
They're in impairing medication.
They're impairing when they'retaken as a drug, some people may
show obvious signs ofimpairment, many people won't.
How do we recognize those safetyrisks?
How do we understand thebusiness risks, again, talking
about the substance use costcalculator and those costs.
How do we understand the humancomponent, the culture
component, when there are peoplein the workforce who are
(08:00):
struggling with drug use or anopioid use disorder that impacts
the workforce and how theworkforce feels, the, the health
of the workplace in general, aswell as the individual health of
the employee.
And then of course, educationresources for employee
themselves to have a bettereducated, more aware workforce.
So that opioids at work employertool kit came out recently in
(08:22):
September of 2019.
And again, it has a set of it'sfour sets of documents and tools
that you can use to in yourworkplace to really evaluate
where your workplace is at andre addressing this, um, and give
some key action steps that canbe really helpful when
addressing the opioid crisis inthe workplace,
Speaker 1 (08:40):
Um, concerning the, uh, the warn me stickers.
There is, there is anotherbenefit that we realized.
And I don't know if othercompanies that you talked to
realize this as well, but as faras the actual handling of the
sticker from the employee oremployer to the it kind of, in
some cases, some contractorstold me there was kind of a, you
(09:01):
know, a bond was built, youknow, relationship was improved.
Now their employers showing theyhave put this on you, I care
about you and take some home toyour family.
I care about your family too.
So that was an absolutelytouching feedback we heard
there.
So, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Yeah.
We hear similar things.
I think that one of the thingsthat, um, is really critical is
when we talk about the opioidcrisis or the overdose epidemic,
or any of the intersectingparts, is that you can't
overstate the impact that stigmahas when people are trying to
seek help.
When people are trying to figureout how to handle, um, an opioid
(09:38):
use disorder or a substance usedisorder, either with themselves
or within their family, right?
It might not be, you know, youremployee, it might be their
spouse or their child or anotherfamily member, or a dear friend
who's dealing with this, whichalso is stressful and can really
impact, um, their presence inthe workplace.
And if they're on yourhealthcare plan, of course,
(09:58):
there's costs associated thereas well.
But if people feel like theywill be judged, if people feel
like they will lose their job,if people feel like they aren't
safe in disclosing this to acoworker, a manager, an HR
professional, anybody, they'renot going to say anything, which
(10:20):
means that we're not going tolearn about it, and then we
can't help.
So like you said, that firststep by saying being proactive
and saying, I care about this, Icare about you is certainly one
of those unspoken things that'scritical for the success of any
opioids at work programimplementation.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
So Rachel, you mentioned the human, uh, and
cultural impact of the opioids,uh, opioid epidemic.
I'm sorry.
I left that out.
What are you seeing from notonly from the national level,
but more from like morespecifically to Pennsylvania,
how is that impactingcontractors and, and overall the
(11:01):
industry as it relates toPennsylvania?
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Sure.
So there's a lot of informationout there about how the
construction industry is one ofthe hardest hit industries in
terms of drug use in general.
Um, late last fall, uh, NYU cameout with a study that showed
that construction workers werethe most likely to use opioids
and cocaine.
So there's a lot of differentreasons for that involving, and
(11:28):
some of them are specific toPennsylvania, some of them
aren't, um, for example, thatEastern seaboard area,
Pennsylvania, you know, even theMassachusetts, Connecticut, and
then a little bit into theMidwest, including Ohio, West,
Virginia, et cetera, et cetera,these are all very hard hit
areas in general, right?
Access is definitely part ofthis conversation areas where
(11:51):
opioids are less prevalent forin the plain States like North
and South Dakota, Wyoming, etcetera.
There's a much lower level ofopioid use due to the access
component.
But when you're in a place whereaccess is pretty high, where the
capacity to access thesesubstances or any substances is
higher, obviously that does alsoequate to more people using
(12:12):
them.
So that's certainly part of it,but we also know that there's
certain factors in constructionand also mining and extraction
industry is
Speaker 3 (12:22):
That they're sorry,
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Hazards, you know, falls injuries from overexertion
being stuck in our crop by heavymachinery injuries from
repetitive or strenuous work, etcetera, leads to pain.
And the most frequent reasonthat people misuse opioids is to
treat pain.
This is why most people misuseopioids, most of the time, you
(12:46):
know, you think that we'retalking about physical pain,
there's certainly a mental paincomponent to it as well.
But oftentimes, especially whenit comes to chronic pain,
there's a lot of research thathas yet to be done in terms of
how to best treat chronic pain.
So people self-medicate, theydon't know what else to do.
Sometimes it's opioids,sometimes it's marijuana with
opioids.
(13:06):
Of course, once you start todevelop a dependence on the
medication, then it can bereally, really difficult to wean
yourself off.
And when you're continuing thosemovements or those motions, or
those repetitive motions thatcan really exacerbate injuries
or pain, or when you're stillputting yourself at risk, then
people aren't going tounderstand how to get themselves
(13:27):
off these medications.
So that's one of those, youknow, those factors with the
construction industry, that'sreally important to consider.
Another thing that we know froma variety of sources is that
when people don't have stable,sick time, when they are not
sure how to help, they're goingto be employed, um, you know, in
(13:49):
the next week, or if they're,they've only got a month and
people tend to push throughtheir pain, right.
As opposed to taking time offand going back, they tend to
push through it because theyneed to so that, you know, they
don't miss work so that they cancome back to work.
So oftentimes these are thekinds of, this is the
intersection that we really seehere is this, this high impact,
higher risk injury for injury,as opposed to, for example, an
(14:13):
office.
I mean, I work from home, right?
My risk of injury is generallyme slipping on my hardwood
floors.
Right.
It's very, very different, um,which I do by the way, because,
you know, I shouldn't be wearing, but sometimes I don't wear
shoes and sometimes I'm wearingsocks and when I slip and I'm
like, well, that was great.
Um, but in general, you know,when, when you're looking at, um
, those people will go to reallyextreme lengths to hide their,
(14:35):
their drug use as a generalthing, they don't want to get
fired.
Um, and they need, they needtheir job.
Right.
And, and especially when it's aseasonal thing, we see this in
the fishing industry as well.
Well, another high impactindustry where it's seasonal,
where people might get hurtthree weeks in, but they're not
going to stop because theycan't.
So this is, you know, one ofthose, a similar situation in
(14:57):
that, in that case,
Speaker 1 (14:59):
You know, it's funny, uh, Rachel, you mentioned, you
know, slipping on the hardwoodfloors and stuff, but I had
surgery a year and a half ago,uh, minor surgery, nothing crazy
as I was getting discharged, thenurse was, you know, standard
procedure going througheverything.
Um, and she handed me aprescription and it was for
Oxycontin and she looked at itbefore she handed it to me.
(15:23):
She, she looked at it again andshe goes, Oh, hold on a second.
I need to check on this.
So she walks, goes, checks withthe doctor, comes back.
It was, you mentioned, I'mbringing this up because you
mentioned access.
The prescription was for ahundred Oxycontin.
Wow.
And like, my wife looked at meand says that there's no way
(15:43):
we're going to, you're never,ever going to use that.
And I said, exactly.
And the nurse at least had theforesight to go and at least
confirm, are you sure you reallywant to do this?
And then when I went to thepharmacist and I said, give me
10, I don't need a hundred.
That that's ridiculous.
You know, but to your point,there are so many times when
(16:04):
people look at it and say, well,Hey, I got a hundred, I'm going
to use a wall.
Um, you know, that isn't reallyhelping anything, but the access
side of things I think is, isanother part of it.
Um, you know, the, the painmanagement world, uh, of the
medical, uh, industry is alwaystrying to help with that.
But at the same time, they'rereally not helping at all.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Yeah.
And I think that, you know,from, from a, from a personal
perspective, what I've learnedis, I mean, so I broke my leg a
few years ago out on the Westcoast.
And then we had to drive homeand I live in Madison,
Wisconsin, and it was a longdrive obviously.
And they gave me a bike and thenI took it for a day because it
made me sick.
And then I was sick and had abroken leg.
And I was like, that's a badcombination too.
So we're just not going to dothat.
(16:49):
But those just, they just sat inmy medicine cabinet.
And that's a pretty common thingwhere people forget about it, or
they specifically choose to keepit, because what if they need it
down the road, especially forpeople who are under insured or
who aren't sure where their nextprescription is going to come
from, or if they're going to beable to get the support that
they need, that a lot of thatcan happen.
(17:12):
And when people are going toelect to say, no, I'm going to
keep these in case I need them,because what if I can't get them
when I do need them?
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Yeah.
It's kind of scary to think thatthat is that's the mentality,
but you understand it too.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Right.
And I think that that's one ofthose really critical moments
where we know when, when youthink about it and you're like,
I just wish people wouldn't dothat.
Of course you do, but it needsto, and this is where we have
this.
We talk a lot about amultifaceted response here,
right?
This has to be about more thanjust personal responsibility to,
to get rid of your medications.
You know, people have to be ableto access what they need for
(17:48):
pain management, includingpossibly, you know, if, if you
know, your doctor says thatactually we want to put you in
occupational therapy, or we wantyou to go to Cairo to like the
chiropractor once a week orwhatever they end up saying.
Oftentimes, I mean, it's a loteasier and it's a lot faster to
take a pill, right.
It's just easier.
It takes less time.
(18:08):
You don't have to take time offof work.
You don't have to do somethingthat maybe you're not
comfortable with.
You know, people who are scaredof needles, aren't going to want
to go to acupuncture, that kindof stuff.
Right.
So, you know, it's part of, it'sa multi-sectoral response and
that not only do we need toincrease the access for non
opioid pain management options,but workplaces have to be able
(18:28):
to give people the time to goaccess those options.
And also to say that, Hey, Iknow that, you know, maybe your
recovery from your injury istaking a little bit longer than
expected, but we want you to beback here and fully healthy as
opposed to back here andpartially healthy and still
trying to self medicate to beable to come back to work.
So there's definitely a, um,several different levels of, um,
(18:54):
engagement here.
And we have to rely on thetreatment industry to increase
access to treatment.
And we need to work with, youknow, the prevention
organizations to, to work onsome of the more in depth
prevention mechanisms.
And there's so many differentcapacity factors here, and we
don't have the capacity to doall of them.
So, you know, this is where wetalk about teaming up in your
community.
And Pennsylvania has a ton ofresources.
(19:17):
It's one of the States that hasa lot of different resources
across the state fromPhiladelphia to Pittsburgh and
everything in between whereit's, the state has been really
proactive, which is a reallypretty cool thing because
there's definitely States whereit's not the case.
So everything from harmreduction organizations to, to,
you know, the criminal justiceworld of social services to
(19:38):
employment stuff, there's somereally cool stuff in
Pennsylvania as a whole.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
And recently the, uh, our governor, Tom Wolf gave his
budget and he was commenting how, um, uh, overdoses are down in
Pennsylvania last year for thefirst time in so many years.
And they really credit all theoutreach that these
organizations and companies do.
Um, so I just wanted to echoyour comments as a man.
He does do a great job, but, butlike, like our governor said,
(20:05):
it's not done until we're downto zero, so we just gotta it up.
And you had something Christhere.
Sorry.
Sorry.
No, that was, that was a reallygood point there, John.
Um, so Rachel, my question foryou is, is what's coming next.
What's what is the nationalsafety council doing next to
continue to build off of all thegreat things that have happened?
Speaker 2 (20:28):
Sure.
So a couple answers to thatquestion.
So one is that we do recognizethat a lot of the resources that
we have built that NIOSH hasbuilt that other industries or
other organizations have builtreally tend to focus on
(20:48):
organizations who are not onlyreally advanced in their safety,
but also have a lot of resourcesat their disposal.
So for example, when I say that,one of the things that I mean is
, um, oftentimes we talk aboutmaking sure that employers
structured their benefits plansto not only cover, um, to not
only cover alternative painmanagement mechanisms of non
(21:10):
opioid pain managementmechanisms, but also to cover
medications for addictiontreatment and, you know,
behavioral health therapies, etcetera, et cetera.
You can't do that.
If you don't have an employerhealth care plan, if you're a
small organization, if you're asmall business, right, this is
not an option for you.
You know, you can do the bestyou can internally, but if
you're not the one providing andnegotiating with your health
insurance providers, then you'reat their whim of the ones that
(21:34):
your employee chooses to buy orto not buy for that matter.
So we that's one of the, one ofthe things that we're really
diving into is ensuring thatsmall businesses have, um, the
resources that they need becausethis impacts small businesses as
well.
We know that the majority ofopioid overdoses that happen on
(21:56):
the job happen in smallbusinesses, small businesses are
less likely to drug test.
They're less likely to have, youknow, some of the policies in
place that we want.
So how do we work with thosebusinesses to get them to them
point where, you know, they canalso take these, these, these
actions.
We are also under, we alsounderstand of course, that
(22:17):
regardless of the size of thebusiness and regardless of the
industry, that there's differentlevels of maturity, some people
are still learning about this.
Maybe it hasn't hit them veryhard yet.
You know, the West coast is juststarting to be hit by the
fentanyl crisis.
It's different.
It goes East to West here.
(22:38):
So the East coast is starting tosee a rise in, in, in stimulant
use after the fentanyl use theWest coast just now is starting
to really get hit with thefentanyl.
So it depends on where you are,right?
So understanding that those,those particular caveats is
really important andunderstanding that there's
always going to be organizationsthat are starting from scratch.
(22:58):
So the more that we know and thedeeper we go into this and the
more mature organizations thatwe partner with closely that we
really work with become, youknow, as they do, as they work
along the entire spectrum ofprevention and treatment and
recovery and all those differentrecommendations about how to
navigate opioids in theworkplace, how they implement
these programs, how they learnabout it, what works, what
(23:20):
doesn't really taking, what welearned from the implementation
that people are doing right now,and helping create a framework
for businesses who are going tobe coming a little bit later.
We also understand, of course,that this is a poly
pharmaceutical drug issue.
It's not just opioids.
Um, I live in Wisconsin, we wereup in Wisconsin, Northern very
(23:40):
Northern Wisconsin.
Um, last may, and all we heardabout was alcohol and because
that's what the issue is upthere.
So it's important, of course, atall times to really, to really
understand that, um, while we dotalk about the opioid crisis and
the opioid crisis is whatsparked this particular
movement, that there is alwaysgoing to be stuff that is that
(24:02):
you can, you can, you can usefor other talking about other
drugs you can use for talkingabout alcohol, being in recovery
is different from person toperson, but you can be in
recovery from a lot of differentthings or just one thing or
whatever that looks like foryou.
And how does that translate tothe workforce?
How do we make a recoveryfriendly workforce?
It's not just going to berecovery friendly for opioids,
(24:23):
it's going to be recoveryfriendly for everything.
So really working on, you know,getting, getting to that point
where, um, EV this understandingof substance use disorders as it
pertains to any substance, notjust opioids.
And then lastly, really lookingat what does it mean to be a
recovery friendly workplace?
How do we support people inrecovery?
(24:46):
What does that look like?
And that is a question that, um,it has a lot of different
answers.
There are certain organizationsthat have really focused on, um,
being a recovery friendlyworkplace.
There's different States thathave really worked on it on a
state level creating programs.
And what that looks like isgoing to be critical, moving
(25:07):
forward as more and more peoplemove to recovery.
Cause that's the whole point isto get people to recovery.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
I think KCA is much like probably a lot of the
groups that you touched on.
A lot of the associations youtouch in that there seems to be
some companies that are moreactive in areas, and some are
more involved in raising theawareness on opioids and some
don't do as much, but, but theones that seem to do a lot, they
always come to me and they'realways like, well, what's an
(25:34):
example of someone that reallydoes good in this area.
And I want to turn to them andsay, you know, you, but in your
role, cause I always want to getbetter, you know, internally,
but, but within your role, doyou know good examples of
companies that really go aboveand beyond and really lead lead
by example?
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Sure.
Um, absolutely.
So there's a couple that come tomind, um, and everything.
Everybody does things a littlebit differently.
So for example, at KCA, you Shave focused a lot on this
prevention component.
The warn me labels, theeducation, the awareness, the
stand downs, which is, you know,uh, that's a classic prevention
(26:13):
mechanism, education andawareness drives everything
else.
So, you know, when people aretalking about prevention
mechanisms, we talk about you,which is great.
So that's cool.
Um, when we talk about, um, someof the policy stuff, we talk a
lot about nationwide, as anexample, nationwide has worked
really hard to create, um, aprogram for their, uh, for all
(26:36):
of their campuses where there'sa lot of education components
too, but they've also built asystem that exists outside of
their company's intranet.
So people can access itanonymously and get the support
they need.
And then they do have a programthat, um, gets triggered when
people either have a positivedrug screen, or when they
voluntarily go to a director,supervisor HR professional and
(26:59):
say that they want to beenrolled.
And it's a treatment program.
Well, it's not a treatmentprogram onsite, but it links
them to a treatment programthey've partnered with.
And, and they work with doctorsto find the best source of
treatment.
That's the type of treatmentthat this person needs.
And their success rate is very,very high for people who choose
to enroll in the program.
And then from a very frontlineperspective, I'm fishing
(27:20):
partnership support services inout of Boston is a really
excellent example of, um,working with the limitations of
an, of an industry, right?
So fishermen often are out onthe water for weeks at a time,
meaning that they don't havesupport if something goes wrong
or, you know, if they are in anactive addiction stage or if
they have an opioid usedisorder, then it can be really,
(27:42):
really tricky.
So, um, JJ Bartlett and theircrew have really worked to get
in a lock zone on the boats todo peer report, uh, peer to peer
recovery services, um, to, andto, to work with treatment
providers in the local area, sothat some of so that they work
with them so that people cantake their medications and all
(28:02):
in a quantity that they canbring out on the water for
several days so that they don'thave to miss doses, et cetera,
et cetera.
So those are some of the mainones we talk about, but I mean,
there's so, so many, and youknow, one of the larger take
home messages is that any actionmakes a difference.
You might be an organization whodoesn't have a ton of capacity
(28:23):
right now for whatever set ofreasons, which is fine.
It happens to all of us, youknow, we all have to work on
different things.
There's other, you know, there'salways urgent things and we all
work to make sure that theurgent doesn't crowd out the
important, but we have to doboth.
So anything makes a difference.
You know, we have videos in ouropioids at work employer
toolkit, there is a two and ahalf minute about drugs in the
(28:45):
brain that you can show youremployees, you know, during an
all staff meeting, there's fiveminutes, safety talks, the
warning labels are free.
Any one of those actions canmake the difference in
somebody's life.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Yeah.
I'm often approached by othercontractor associations and
theirs, and they'll say, Oh,you're a leader in this area.
And I'm like, well, I'm actuallynot, not a leader.
I'm just a follower.
National safety council is theleader.
So
Speaker 2 (29:10):
You are, you, you are a leader like in that, that's
the, one of those things that,you know, we all, we all lead in
different ways because leadingby example is one of those
really important things.
And that's one thing that wetalk about a lot internally is
we, you have to lead by example,things are important and you
know, then you have toprioritize them.
But if we don't do it, then howcan, you know, we all have to do
(29:30):
it together.
So
Speaker 1 (29:32):
That's a great way to , uh, kind of pull this
together.
And, and John, I, I, I'm goingto put words in your mouth and,
and, and thank Rachel, but moreimportantly, um, you know, isn't
it nice to hear from somebody atthe, at th that is overseeing
the nation and how things aregoing, that you're a leader.
So hats off to you, John and theKCA for, for doing such a great
(29:53):
job in Pennsylvania.
Thank you.
We just want to keep doing oursmall little part and thank you
for helping us write though.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
Anytime.
Yeah.
That's what we do.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Well, Rachel, thank you for joining us today.
And it was very, very, uh,important topic for the
industry.
Um, again, this is Chris Martinand my partner, John O'Brien,
uh, we want to say thank you andwe'll have more, uh, exciting
and, uh, very relevant topicscoming up in future episodes.
So stay tuned.
Hello, and welcome to the PA construction industry
podcast recorded right here inthe Commonwealth of
Pennsylvania.
I am one of the hosts, DonO'Brien from the Keystone
contractors association.
And this is Chris Martin withAtlas marketing, where we tell
stories for people who buildthings.
(00:21):
Awesome.
Glad you're with us today.
I hope you're ready for anotherepisode here, Chris.
Uh, this is, uh, this is a, thisis a very timely, uh, very, uh,
important, uh, topic for notonly for both of us, but for the
entire industry.
So this is great.
Yeah, absolutely.
Uh, the topic is, uh, somethingvery near and dear to the
(00:44):
construction industry and theKCA members.
So about three and a half yearsago, I was hired by the KCA and
the KCA is located in centralPA.
The headquarters is Harrisburgand I left Pittsburgh and this
was a new membership ofconstruction companies.
And the first thing I wanted todo was really find the strengths
(01:05):
and weaknesses of these membersand get to know more about them
and among challenges.
There was a reoccurring issuethat kept popping up throughout
these construction companiesbased.
And it was, it was the opioidissue and how it is drastically
affecting, you know, their ownworkforce and their communities.
(01:26):
And it's just tearing familiesand communities apart, and the
KCA wanted to do something aboutit.
So I started making a bunch ofcalls and contacts to industry
friends, and everyone said thesame thing.
You got to go to the nationalsafety council, they have the
premier resources.
(01:46):
It's a great educational, uh,outlet for information.
And I'm just thrilled andexcited to have Rachel Cooper
from the national safety councilwith us today to talk about, um,
opioids and, and, uh, yeah, I'mreally excited to welcome to the
show right now.
Speaker 2 (02:03):
Thank you guys.
Thank you for having me.
Speaker 1 (02:07):
Yeah.
So as I mentioned, a topic todayis opioid awareness and the
effect on the industry.
Um, can you kind of give usmaybe your background and kind
of lead up to, uh, you know,your involvement in, on this
serious issue?
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Absolutely.
So, thanks again for having me.
My name is Rachel Cooper and Iam the senior program manager
and subject matter expert onopioids for the national safety
council.
My personal background is onethat's based, um, in both
international and public health.
So I started working on theopioid epidemic abroad when I
(02:45):
was living in France severalyears ago, I have moved back to
the States and I have workedboth on the front lines, doing a
lot of programming, gettingpeople into treatment and
getting people to support thatthey need people who have an
opioid use disorder.
And then now I'm working for thenational safety council.
And what we're primarily workingon right now is the intersection
(03:06):
of opioids and how it impactsthe workplace.
So when I say workplace, I mean,both employers and employees.
So that is how our programmingcame to John's ears.
And a lot of what we do rightnow as pertains to opioid
awareness is really aboutrealizing that this is an issue
(03:27):
that we can all impact.
This is something that we canall learn about that we can all
change.
The opioid crisis is complex,and it has many different faces
and many different storylines,and it impacts us all
differently, but we can supportourselves and help ourselves and
help our neighbors and ourcommunities and our colleagues
and our coworkers by learningmore about the issue and really
(03:50):
increasing the education andawareness about the issue.
Speaker 1 (03:53):
Great.
Great to have you on the showhere and on behalf of the KCA
membership, thank you for allthe resources you guys have
supplied us.
The NCSS supplied us.
Um, they've been extremelyhelpful for the employers.
Um, you know, we get thestickers on the insurance and,
um, medication cards.
That's, that's been awesome.
It's been chronicled in mediaoutlets.
(04:16):
Um, any, any other, uh, well, ofcourse you got the resource
guide just came out.
Speaker 2 (04:23):
Yeah.
Yeah.
Let me give a, I can talk alittle bit about the things that
you know that we've, we've putout.
So the stickers that youmentioned, just to clarify,
those are the warn me labels inwarn me labels are intended for
anybody who uses a pharmacy,right?
So anybody who receives aprescription, which is most of
us, one thing that we know isthat oftentimes when you're
(04:44):
prescribed a medication, you'renot exactly sure what it is,
right?
You might be prescribedsomething and it doesn't sound
like something you've heard of.
We know that that's also verytrue with opioids.
A lot of us are very familiarwith say oxycodone or Percocet
or Vicodin.
Those names are very familiar topeople, but there's ones that
are equally unfamiliar, such asTramadol.
(05:06):
Tramadol is also an opioid forexample, or some of the generic
names that we might notrecognize as an opioid, what a
warning label does is it, youstick it on your own pharmacy
loyalty card or your insurancecard or whatever.
And it says, opioids warn me.
And it's a reminder to yourselfto ask your doctor for
questions, which are provided toyou about, you know, am I being
(05:29):
prescribed an opioid?
Um, is there an alternative, ifthere isn't an alternative, how
can I take this safely, etcetera, et cetera.
And it's a reminder, not onlyfor you, but when you present
your pharmacy card to yourpharmacist, it's a reminder for
them as well.
So this is one of those toolsthat we thought was really
useful in the workplace.
And there's a lot, like yousaid, it's been published in the
(05:51):
media because we give them outin little cards of four.
So not only do you put it onyour own pharmacy card, you can
take it home for your family, oryou can pass it to friends and
they are free and can be ordered, um, on our website at
nsc.org/take action.
So that's one of the reallyconcrete tools that we've put
out the second tool.
And this is really aboutengaging businesses and
(06:14):
understanding the impact thatthe opioid crisis has had on the
workplace is our substance usecost calculator and the
substance use cost calculatortakes your organization's size
it's industry and the state thatyou're in and uses a variety of
sources to debt of data, tocalculate the financial impact
(06:36):
that the opioid crisis has hadon your workplace from turnover
to absenteeism, to increasehealth care costs, to workers'
compensation costs.
This tool pulls together all ofthat information so that you can
see the cost of substance use,not just opioids, but also
including alcohol cannabis, etcetera, is having on your
(06:56):
workplace.
It also shows you how much moneyyou can save by supporting
employees through recovery.
The third tool that was justmentioned is the NSC opioids at
work employer tool kit, and theemployer toolkit is a set of
resources targeted at four mainaudiences, HR professionals,
(07:18):
safety professionals, managers,and supervisors, and employees
themselves.
We came to the conclusion afterserving, um, several hundred
organizations across the countrythat all four of those groups
are necessary to create acomprehensive program to address
opioids in the workplace.
Opioids have a safety impact.
(07:39):
They're in impairing medication.
They're impairing when they'retaken as a drug, some people may
show obvious signs ofimpairment, many people won't.
How do we recognize those safetyrisks?
How do we understand thebusiness risks, again, talking
about the substance use costcalculator and those costs.
How do we understand the humancomponent, the culture
component, when there are peoplein the workforce who are
(08:00):
struggling with drug use or anopioid use disorder that impacts
the workforce and how theworkforce feels, the, the health
of the workplace in general, aswell as the individual health of
the employee.
And then of course, educationresources for employee
themselves to have a bettereducated, more aware workforce.
So that opioids at work employertool kit came out recently in
(08:22):
September of 2019.
And again, it has a set of it'sfour sets of documents and tools
that you can use to in yourworkplace to really evaluate
where your workplace is at andre addressing this, um, and give
some key action steps that canbe really helpful when
addressing the opioid crisis inthe workplace,
Speaker 1 (08:40):
Um, concerning the, uh, the warn me stickers.
There is, there is anotherbenefit that we realized.
And I don't know if othercompanies that you talked to
realize this as well, but as faras the actual handling of the
sticker from the employee oremployer to the it kind of, in
some cases, some contractorstold me there was kind of a, you
(09:01):
know, a bond was built, youknow, relationship was improved.
Now their employers showing theyhave put this on you, I care
about you and take some home toyour family.
I care about your family too.
So that was an absolutelytouching feedback we heard
there.
So, yeah.
Speaker 2 (09:15):
Yeah.
We hear similar things.
I think that one of the thingsthat, um, is really critical is
when we talk about the opioidcrisis or the overdose epidemic,
or any of the intersectingparts, is that you can't
overstate the impact that stigmahas when people are trying to
seek help.
When people are trying to figureout how to handle, um, an opioid
(09:38):
use disorder or a substance usedisorder, either with themselves
or within their family, right?
It might not be, you know, youremployee, it might be their
spouse or their child or anotherfamily member, or a dear friend
who's dealing with this, whichalso is stressful and can really
impact, um, their presence inthe workplace.
And if they're on yourhealthcare plan, of course,
(09:58):
there's costs associated thereas well.
But if people feel like theywill be judged, if people feel
like they will lose their job,if people feel like they aren't
safe in disclosing this to acoworker, a manager, an HR
professional, anybody, they'renot going to say anything, which
(10:20):
means that we're not going tolearn about it, and then we
can't help.
So like you said, that firststep by saying being proactive
and saying, I care about this, Icare about you is certainly one
of those unspoken things that'scritical for the success of any
opioids at work programimplementation.
Speaker 1 (10:38):
So Rachel, you mentioned the human, uh, and
cultural impact of the opioids,uh, opioid epidemic.
I'm sorry.
I left that out.
What are you seeing from notonly from the national level,
but more from like morespecifically to Pennsylvania,
how is that impactingcontractors and, and overall the
(11:01):
industry as it relates toPennsylvania?
Speaker 2 (11:04):
Sure.
So there's a lot of informationout there about how the
construction industry is one ofthe hardest hit industries in
terms of drug use in general.
Um, late last fall, uh, NYU cameout with a study that showed
that construction workers werethe most likely to use opioids
and cocaine.
So there's a lot of differentreasons for that involving, and
(11:28):
some of them are specific toPennsylvania, some of them
aren't, um, for example, thatEastern seaboard area,
Pennsylvania, you know, even theMassachusetts, Connecticut, and
then a little bit into theMidwest, including Ohio, West,
Virginia, et cetera, et cetera,these are all very hard hit
areas in general, right?
Access is definitely part ofthis conversation areas where
(11:51):
opioids are less prevalent forin the plain States like North
and South Dakota, Wyoming, etcetera.
There's a much lower level ofopioid use due to the access
component.
But when you're in a place whereaccess is pretty high, where the
capacity to access thesesubstances or any substances is
higher, obviously that does alsoequate to more people using
(12:12):
them.
So that's certainly part of it,but we also know that there's
certain factors in constructionand also mining and extraction
industry is
Speaker 3 (12:22):
That they're sorry,
Speaker 2 (12:23):
Hazards, you know, falls injuries from overexertion
being stuck in our crop by heavymachinery injuries from
repetitive or strenuous work, etcetera, leads to pain.
And the most frequent reasonthat people misuse opioids is to
treat pain.
This is why most people misuseopioids, most of the time, you
(12:46):
know, you think that we'retalking about physical pain,
there's certainly a mental paincomponent to it as well.
But oftentimes, especially whenit comes to chronic pain,
there's a lot of research thathas yet to be done in terms of
how to best treat chronic pain.
So people self-medicate, theydon't know what else to do.
Sometimes it's opioids,sometimes it's marijuana with
opioids.
(13:06):
Of course, once you start todevelop a dependence on the
medication, then it can bereally, really difficult to wean
yourself off.
And when you're continuing thosemovements or those motions, or
those repetitive motions thatcan really exacerbate injuries
or pain, or when you're stillputting yourself at risk, then
people aren't going tounderstand how to get themselves
(13:27):
off these medications.
So that's one of those, youknow, those factors with the
construction industry, that'sreally important to consider.
Another thing that we know froma variety of sources is that
when people don't have stable,sick time, when they are not
sure how to help, they're goingto be employed, um, you know, in
(13:49):
the next week, or if they're,they've only got a month and
people tend to push throughtheir pain, right.
As opposed to taking time offand going back, they tend to
push through it because theyneed to so that, you know, they
don't miss work so that they cancome back to work.
So oftentimes these are thekinds of, this is the
intersection that we really seehere is this, this high impact,
higher risk injury for injury,as opposed to, for example, an
(14:13):
office.
I mean, I work from home, right?
My risk of injury is generallyme slipping on my hardwood
floors.
Right.
It's very, very different, um,which I do by the way, because,
you know, I shouldn't be wearing, but sometimes I don't wear
shoes and sometimes I'm wearingsocks and when I slip and I'm
like, well, that was great.
Um, but in general, you know,when, when you're looking at, um
, those people will go to reallyextreme lengths to hide their,
(14:35):
their drug use as a generalthing, they don't want to get
fired.
Um, and they need, they needtheir job.
Right.
And, and especially when it's aseasonal thing, we see this in
the fishing industry as well.
Well, another high impactindustry where it's seasonal,
where people might get hurtthree weeks in, but they're not
going to stop because theycan't.
So this is, you know, one ofthose, a similar situation in
(14:57):
that, in that case,
Speaker 1 (14:59):
You know, it's funny, uh, Rachel, you mentioned, you
know, slipping on the hardwoodfloors and stuff, but I had
surgery a year and a half ago,uh, minor surgery, nothing crazy
as I was getting discharged, thenurse was, you know, standard
procedure going througheverything.
Um, and she handed me aprescription and it was for
Oxycontin and she looked at itbefore she handed it to me.
(15:23):
She, she looked at it again andshe goes, Oh, hold on a second.
I need to check on this.
So she walks, goes, checks withthe doctor, comes back.
It was, you mentioned, I'mbringing this up because you
mentioned access.
The prescription was for ahundred Oxycontin.
Wow.
And like, my wife looked at meand says that there's no way
(15:43):
we're going to, you're never,ever going to use that.
And I said, exactly.
And the nurse at least had theforesight to go and at least
confirm, are you sure you reallywant to do this?
And then when I went to thepharmacist and I said, give me
10, I don't need a hundred.
That that's ridiculous.
You know, but to your point,there are so many times when
(16:04):
people look at it and say, well,Hey, I got a hundred, I'm going
to use a wall.
Um, you know, that isn't reallyhelping anything, but the access
side of things I think is, isanother part of it.
Um, you know, the, the painmanagement world, uh, of the
medical, uh, industry is alwaystrying to help with that.
But at the same time, they'rereally not helping at all.
Speaker 2 (16:28):
Yeah.
And I think that, you know,from, from a, from a personal
perspective, what I've learnedis, I mean, so I broke my leg a
few years ago out on the Westcoast.
And then we had to drive homeand I live in Madison,
Wisconsin, and it was a longdrive obviously.
And they gave me a bike and thenI took it for a day because it
made me sick.
And then I was sick and had abroken leg.
And I was like, that's a badcombination too.
So we're just not going to dothat.
(16:49):
But those just, they just sat inmy medicine cabinet.
And that's a pretty common thingwhere people forget about it, or
they specifically choose to keepit, because what if they need it
down the road, especially forpeople who are under insured or
who aren't sure where their nextprescription is going to come
from, or if they're going to beable to get the support that
they need, that a lot of thatcan happen.
(17:12):
And when people are going toelect to say, no, I'm going to
keep these in case I need them,because what if I can't get them
when I do need them?
Speaker 1 (17:18):
Yeah.
It's kind of scary to think thatthat is that's the mentality,
but you understand it too.
Speaker 2 (17:26):
Right.
And I think that that's one ofthose really critical moments
where we know when, when youthink about it and you're like,
I just wish people wouldn't dothat.
Of course you do, but it needsto, and this is where we have
this.
We talk a lot about amultifaceted response here,
right?
This has to be about more thanjust personal responsibility to,
to get rid of your medications.
You know, people have to be ableto access what they need for
(17:48):
pain management, includingpossibly, you know, if, if you
know, your doctor says thatactually we want to put you in
occupational therapy, or we wantyou to go to Cairo to like the
chiropractor once a week orwhatever they end up saying.
Oftentimes, I mean, it's a loteasier and it's a lot faster to
take a pill, right.
It's just easier.
It takes less time.
(18:08):
You don't have to take time offof work.
You don't have to do somethingthat maybe you're not
comfortable with.
You know, people who are scaredof needles, aren't going to want
to go to acupuncture, that kindof stuff.
Right.
So, you know, it's part of, it'sa multi-sectoral response and
that not only do we need toincrease the access for non
opioid pain management options,but workplaces have to be able
(18:28):
to give people the time to goaccess those options.
And also to say that, Hey, Iknow that, you know, maybe your
recovery from your injury istaking a little bit longer than
expected, but we want you to beback here and fully healthy as
opposed to back here andpartially healthy and still
trying to self medicate to beable to come back to work.
So there's definitely a, um,several different levels of, um,
(18:54):
engagement here.
And we have to rely on thetreatment industry to increase
access to treatment.
And we need to work with, youknow, the prevention
organizations to, to work onsome of the more in depth
prevention mechanisms.
And there's so many differentcapacity factors here, and we
don't have the capacity to doall of them.
So, you know, this is where wetalk about teaming up in your
community.
And Pennsylvania has a ton ofresources.
(19:17):
It's one of the States that hasa lot of different resources
across the state fromPhiladelphia to Pittsburgh and
everything in between whereit's, the state has been really
proactive, which is a reallypretty cool thing because
there's definitely States whereit's not the case.
So everything from harmreduction organizations to, to,
you know, the criminal justiceworld of social services to
(19:38):
employment stuff, there's somereally cool stuff in
Pennsylvania as a whole.
Speaker 1 (19:42):
And recently the, uh, our governor, Tom Wolf gave his
budget and he was commenting how, um, uh, overdoses are down in
Pennsylvania last year for thefirst time in so many years.
And they really credit all theoutreach that these
organizations and companies do.
Um, so I just wanted to echoyour comments as a man.
He does do a great job, but, butlike, like our governor said,
(20:05):
it's not done until we're downto zero, so we just gotta it up.
And you had something Christhere.
Sorry.
Sorry.
No, that was, that was a reallygood point there, John.
Um, so Rachel, my question foryou is, is what's coming next.
What's what is the nationalsafety council doing next to
continue to build off of all thegreat things that have happened?
Speaker 2 (20:28):
Sure.
So a couple answers to thatquestion.
So one is that we do recognizethat a lot of the resources that
we have built that NIOSH hasbuilt that other industries or
other organizations have builtreally tend to focus on
(20:48):
organizations who are not onlyreally advanced in their safety,
but also have a lot of resourcesat their disposal.
So for example, when I say that,one of the things that I mean is
, um, oftentimes we talk aboutmaking sure that employers
structured their benefits plansto not only cover, um, to not
only cover alternative painmanagement mechanisms of non
(21:10):
opioid pain managementmechanisms, but also to cover
medications for addictiontreatment and, you know,
behavioral health therapies, etcetera, et cetera.
You can't do that.
If you don't have an employerhealth care plan, if you're a
small organization, if you're asmall business, right, this is
not an option for you.
You know, you can do the bestyou can internally, but if
you're not the one providing andnegotiating with your health
insurance providers, then you'reat their whim of the ones that
(21:34):
your employee chooses to buy orto not buy for that matter.
So we that's one of the, one ofthe things that we're really
diving into is ensuring thatsmall businesses have, um, the
resources that they need becausethis impacts small businesses as
well.
We know that the majority ofopioid overdoses that happen on
(21:56):
the job happen in smallbusinesses, small businesses are
less likely to drug test.
They're less likely to have, youknow, some of the policies in
place that we want.
So how do we work with thosebusinesses to get them to them
point where, you know, they canalso take these, these, these
actions.
We are also under, we alsounderstand of course, that
(22:17):
regardless of the size of thebusiness and regardless of the
industry, that there's differentlevels of maturity, some people
are still learning about this.
Maybe it hasn't hit them veryhard yet.
You know, the West coast is juststarting to be hit by the
fentanyl crisis.
It's different.
It goes East to West here.
(22:38):
So the East coast is starting tosee a rise in, in, in stimulant
use after the fentanyl use theWest coast just now is starting
to really get hit with thefentanyl.
So it depends on where you are,right?
So understanding that those,those particular caveats is
really important andunderstanding that there's
always going to be organizationsthat are starting from scratch.
(22:58):
So the more that we know and thedeeper we go into this and the
more mature organizations thatwe partner with closely that we
really work with become, youknow, as they do, as they work
along the entire spectrum ofprevention and treatment and
recovery and all those differentrecommendations about how to
navigate opioids in theworkplace, how they implement
these programs, how they learnabout it, what works, what
(23:20):
doesn't really taking, what welearned from the implementation
that people are doing right now,and helping create a framework
for businesses who are going tobe coming a little bit later.
We also understand, of course,that this is a poly
pharmaceutical drug issue.
It's not just opioids.
Um, I live in Wisconsin, we wereup in Wisconsin, Northern very
(23:40):
Northern Wisconsin.
Um, last may, and all we heardabout was alcohol and because
that's what the issue is upthere.
So it's important, of course, atall times to really, to really
understand that, um, while we dotalk about the opioid crisis and
the opioid crisis is whatsparked this particular
movement, that there is alwaysgoing to be stuff that is that
(24:02):
you can, you can, you can usefor other talking about other
drugs you can use for talkingabout alcohol, being in recovery
is different from person toperson, but you can be in
recovery from a lot of differentthings or just one thing or
whatever that looks like foryou.
And how does that translate tothe workforce?
How do we make a recoveryfriendly workforce?
It's not just going to berecovery friendly for opioids,
(24:23):
it's going to be recoveryfriendly for everything.
So really working on, you know,getting, getting to that point
where, um, EV this understandingof substance use disorders as it
pertains to any substance, notjust opioids.
And then lastly, really lookingat what does it mean to be a
recovery friendly workplace?
How do we support people inrecovery?
(24:46):
What does that look like?
And that is a question that, um,it has a lot of different
answers.
There are certain organizationsthat have really focused on, um,
being a recovery friendlyworkplace.
There's different States thathave really worked on it on a
state level creating programs.
And what that looks like isgoing to be critical, moving
(25:07):
forward as more and more peoplemove to recovery.
Cause that's the whole point isto get people to recovery.
Speaker 1 (25:12):
I think KCA is much like probably a lot of the
groups that you touched on.
A lot of the associations youtouch in that there seems to be
some companies that are moreactive in areas, and some are
more involved in raising theawareness on opioids and some
don't do as much, but, but theones that seem to do a lot, they
always come to me and they'realways like, well, what's an
(25:34):
example of someone that reallydoes good in this area.
And I want to turn to them andsay, you know, you, but in your
role, cause I always want to getbetter, you know, internally,
but, but within your role, doyou know good examples of
companies that really go aboveand beyond and really lead lead
by example?
Speaker 2 (25:52):
Sure.
Um, absolutely.
So there's a couple that come tomind, um, and everything.
Everybody does things a littlebit differently.
So for example, at KCA, you Shave focused a lot on this
prevention component.
The warn me labels, theeducation, the awareness, the
stand downs, which is, you know,uh, that's a classic prevention
(26:13):
mechanism, education andawareness drives everything
else.
So, you know, when people aretalking about prevention
mechanisms, we talk about you,which is great.
So that's cool.
Um, when we talk about, um, someof the policy stuff, we talk a
lot about nationwide, as anexample, nationwide has worked
really hard to create, um, aprogram for their, uh, for all
(26:36):
of their campuses where there'sa lot of education components
too, but they've also built asystem that exists outside of
their company's intranet.
So people can access itanonymously and get the support
they need.
And then they do have a programthat, um, gets triggered when
people either have a positivedrug screen, or when they
voluntarily go to a director,supervisor HR professional and
(26:59):
say that they want to beenrolled.
And it's a treatment program.
Well, it's not a treatmentprogram onsite, but it links
them to a treatment programthey've partnered with.
And, and they work with doctorsto find the best source of
treatment.
That's the type of treatmentthat this person needs.
And their success rate is very,very high for people who choose
to enroll in the program.
And then from a very frontlineperspective, I'm fishing
(27:20):
partnership support services inout of Boston is a really
excellent example of, um,working with the limitations of
an, of an industry, right?
So fishermen often are out onthe water for weeks at a time,
meaning that they don't havesupport if something goes wrong
or, you know, if they are in anactive addiction stage or if
they have an opioid usedisorder, then it can be really,
(27:42):
really tricky.
So, um, JJ Bartlett and theircrew have really worked to get
in a lock zone on the boats todo peer report, uh, peer to peer
recovery services, um, to, andto, to work with treatment
providers in the local area, sothat some of so that they work
with them so that people cantake their medications and all
(28:02):
in a quantity that they canbring out on the water for
several days so that they don'thave to miss doses, et cetera,
et cetera.
So those are some of the mainones we talk about, but I mean,
there's so, so many, and youknow, one of the larger take
home messages is that any actionmakes a difference.
You might be an organization whodoesn't have a ton of capacity
(28:23):
right now for whatever set ofreasons, which is fine.
It happens to all of us, youknow, we all have to work on
different things.
There's other, you know, there'salways urgent things and we all
work to make sure that theurgent doesn't crowd out the
important, but we have to doboth.
So anything makes a difference.
You know, we have videos in ouropioids at work employer
toolkit, there is a two and ahalf minute about drugs in the
(28:45):
brain that you can show youremployees, you know, during an
all staff meeting, there's fiveminutes, safety talks, the
warning labels are free.
Any one of those actions canmake the difference in
somebody's life.
Speaker 1 (28:56):
Yeah.
I'm often approached by othercontractor associations and
theirs, and they'll say, Oh,you're a leader in this area.
And I'm like, well, I'm actuallynot, not a leader.
I'm just a follower.
National safety council is theleader.
So
Speaker 2 (29:10):
You are, you, you are a leader like in that, that's
the, one of those things that,you know, we all, we all lead in
different ways because leadingby example is one of those
really important things.
And that's one thing that wetalk about a lot internally is
we, you have to lead by example,things are important and you
know, then you have toprioritize them.
But if we don't do it, then howcan, you know, we all have to do
(29:30):
it together.
So
Speaker 1 (29:32):
That's a great way to , uh, kind of pull this
together.
And, and John, I, I, I'm goingto put words in your mouth and,
and, and thank Rachel, but moreimportantly, um, you know, isn't
it nice to hear from somebody atthe, at th that is overseeing
the nation and how things aregoing, that you're a leader.
So hats off to you, John and theKCA for, for doing such a great
(29:53):
job in Pennsylvania.
Thank you.
We just want to keep doing oursmall little part and thank you
for helping us write though.
Speaker 2 (30:00):
Yeah.
Oh yeah.
Anytime.
Yeah.
That's what we do.
Yeah.
Speaker 1 (30:04):
Well, Rachel, thank you for joining us today.
And it was very, very, uh,important topic for the
industry.
Um, again, this is Chris Martinand my partner, John O'Brien,
uh, we want to say thank you andwe'll have more, uh, exciting
and, uh, very relevant topicscoming up in future episodes.
So stay tuned.
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