Airing on Eyewitness News, KBAK, this interview with First Steps Recovery’s director, Dr. Matthew Tatum, gives insight on the opioid epidemic. The current crisis is affecting individuals across the country , and First Steps Recovery offers quality drug and alcohol detox as well as residential treatment (rehab) to help people find lasting recovery.
Full Video Transcription:
Opioid Crisis in California’s Central Valley
Erin Briscoe: Welcome back to health alert we’ve been
hearing a lot about the opioid crisis
and talking about it in the US and
actually happening here in our own backyard
but that is not the only addiction
happening, and here to talk about the
help that’s available and of course what
families can do today is Dr. Matthew
Tatum who is the executive director at
first steps recovery in Clovis. Dr. Tatum
thank you so much for being on our show
you know and the reason why I mentioned
opioid addiction first because that is
something that’s been making headlines
now right we’ve been hearing an opioid
epidemic so what is exactly does that
mean
Matthew Tatum: Yeah epidemic just means it’s a very
wide spread it’s a huge problem so the
Center for Disease Control actually just
released 2016 data on opioid-related
overdoses and what that data has shown
us is a 26 percent increase in opioid
related deaths in the nation and so now
we’re up to over 42,000 opioid related
deaths a country which has now surpassed
the AIDS epidemic when it was at its
peak.
Briscoe: And when we talk about opioids
what is that? is that the the prescribed
medications?
Tatum: It can be it’s kind of a
classification of drugs so it can be any
of the prescription pain pills but it
also includes heroin and things like
that.
Briscoe: Okay and why do you think that
number has gone up so much?
Tatum: there’s lots of discussion about that the use of
prescription pain pills by physicians
but also the advent of synthetic opiates
as well things like synthetic fentanyl
and things like that become very popular
on the streets.
Briscoe: Okay. Well other than opioid which is what we
you know we keep hearing about but
there’s other things happening right
there’s heroin alcohol affecting the San
Joaquin Valley right
Tatum: Definitely yeah. If you grew up in the valley like I did
you hear a lot about methamphetamine you
hear people say that the San Joaquin
Valley is you know the largest producer
of methamphetamine in the entire world
and actually according to the DEA 80% of
the world’s methamphetamine is produced
here in the valley and one third of drug
users in the valley are methamphetamine
users, but at first ups recovery we see
not only methamphetamine as people’s
drug of choice but alcohol abuse,
prescription pain pills, heroin things of that
nature.
Briscoe: And do a lot of these drugs or
even alcohol does it go hand in hand you
know someone who maybe starts you know
here might you know have multiple
addictions.
Tatum: Yeah a lot of times people
will sort of use whatever they can get
their hands on. We do see people that
stick just to pain pills you do see
people that stick just to alcohol and
then you see people that are using a lot
of combinations which actually can be
more lethal when people are combining
things like opiates and alcohol and
benzodiazepines.
Briscoe: Oh wow okay so First Steps Recovery
this is what you guys
deal with right it’s a little bit
different we’re talking about it’s not
your typical hospital setting.
Tatum: Yeah we’re
a small residential setting by
residential where we’re actually in a
home in the foothills and so we serve a
smaller number of people so we have
really individualized care smaller group
sizes a very warm atmosphere but that
being said we’re also on the leading
edge of all neuro-scientific research. We
have people all over the world
conducting studies on how addiction
affects the brain, and so we take that
research and we boil it down to the
treatment setting and we say how can we
help this individual based on what we
know about addiction in the brain in
this treatment setting and so we apply
that research in order to help them heal
their brains.
Briscoe: Wow okay I want to touch
right now with family and friends, so if
someone is seeing signs that their loved
one is you know possibly addicted to you
know drugs or even alcohol what is it
what is the one thing they can do or how
do you approach that situation?
Tatum: That’s a really good question if you watch
popular TV shows they will tell you to
threaten your loved one in order to get
them to comply with your request to go
to treatment and while that’s really
good television it’s not helping people
get what they need, which is professional
help, so I would first say stop
threatening the addicts in your life and
start loving them. Now we need to
communicate our care and concern for
them and set firm limits and boundaries
but we also need to let them know that
we love them and that we’re there for
them no matter what and that’s a really tough balance
to find but when you speak to the right
people you can get help in finding that
balance and what that looks like for the
loved one in your life.
Briscoe: Okay you’re right
you know you see that you do see that
threatening all up and it’s it’s TV
again right not real life or semi real
life First Steps Recovery so if you want
that information if you are a family
member right now or have a friend and
you want to get that info you can call
but here’s all the information on your
screen right now there is a 24 hour
hotline there’s firststepsrecovery.com again this is in Clovis you can get
all that information by contacting them.
Dr. Tatum thank you so much for being on
this show because this is such an
important topic that you know sometimes
we just we talk about it quickly but
don’t you know go into depth and really
talk about the issue affecting the
valley. Thank you we’ll be
right back.
If you or a loved one are need treatment for an addiction, call First Steps Recovery today: 1-844-489-0836.
