addiction

Opioid addicts can seek help on doctor-led Canadian website

Photograph by: Arlen Redekop , Vancouver Sun

Three years ago Jenn Dutton was a successful psychiatric nurse, living in a Vancouver suburb with her boyfriend and his two children.

After a rear-end car accident left her with painful whiplash injuries in her back and neck, Dutton’s physician prescribed Percocet, an opioid pain reliever. Thus, innocently, began her descent into hell.

Addict's Story Highlights Unregulated Recovery Homes, Services

After 20 years of helping others battle their addictions, Mike Pond succumbed to his own.

It was 2008, and he had lost everything to alcoholism: his psychotherapy practice in Kelowna, his wife, his three sons, his house, even his driver's licence.

P.E.I. government adding three positions to addictions treatment services

The P.E.I. government says three new frontline workers should improve services for people dealing with addiction.

Health and Wellness Minister Doug Currie says the positions include an addictions patient navigator, an outreach social worker and a complex case co-ordinator.

He says the additions should ensure more timely access to services and make it easier for people to navigate the system.

Click here to read the full story

Squamish centre treats addiction and depression

Photograph by : Arlen Redekop, PNG Files

For nearly five years, Barbara - a mother and wife based in the Kootenays - “couldn't see a way out” of her debilitating depression.

“I was just getting worse and worse,” Barbara, who asked that her last name not be used, told Vancouver Desi. “My whole outlook on life was just black. I couldn't see a way out.”

Fortunately, she heard about the Chopra Addiction & Wellness Center in Squamish - one of B.C.'s few residential treatment centres.

Larissa Cahute Reports

Vancouver prescription heroin users wage court battle with the feds

ANOTHER VANCOUVER-BASED HARM-REDUCTION initiative is entering the courts in a battle with the federal government.

On March 25, Providence Health Care and five long-time opiate users will appear in B.C. Supreme Court as plaintiffs in an effort to secure diacetylmorphine, or prescription heroin, as a legal means of managing addiction.

How 'One-Stop' Care Lifts New Moms from Addiction

Sun streams into the bright room painted in vibrant hues of green and blue. In a messy circle of soft sofas, baby strollers and rockers, six women sit watching infants crawl at their feet and toddlers play with scattered toys. Loud laughter fills the room, adding to the cheerful ambience. Looking in from the outside, it seems the typical sort of “mom meet-up” that happens in living rooms and community centres anywhere.

B.C. mental-health plan includes outreach team, group homes

The B.C. government has announced a new action plan for patients with mental-health challenges, a response to a declaration by Vancouver’s mayor and police chief that the city faces a crisis in handling people with severe, untreated mental illness.

Heroin Prescription Lawsuit Challenges Closure Of Federal Exemption

For decades, Larry Love's daily life was consumed by heroin. Find it. Inject it. Repeat. That cycle, he said, was broken last year when he enrolled in a radical clinical trial in Vancouver evaluating the use of prescription heroin, seen as the treatment of last resort for severely addicted people for whom other therapy, such as methadone or detox, have failed.

A Letter to Canada’s Minister of Disease?

Dear Rona Ambrose, As a member of the federal government, you are currently titled Canada’s Health Minister. I question the accuracy of that nomenclature.

Feds could face legal showdown over addicts’ right to prescription heroin

Ottawa could face a legal showdown with some of Vancouver’s hardest-core addicts as they’re cut off from government-supplied heroin doctors say is their only viable treatment option.

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