CLINIC OFFERS HOPE FOR ADDICTS

Methadone Treatment a 'Saviour'

Jason Martin and Kathy Wroblewski's days used to revolve around
getting high.

The couple would wake up and go to bed thinking about OxyContin, a
powerful painkiller they bought on the street. They were unable to
focus on their children or their health. Eventually, they lost custody
of the kids and Wroblewski feared she wouldn't get to see them grow
up.

"The pills took everything out of us," she said. "I thought: 'For
sure, these things are going to kill me.'"

With their lives spiralling out of control, the couple decided to
enter the Drouillard Road Clinic's methadone program. Wroblewski was
pregnant with the couple's third son at the time.

"We hit rock bottom," Martin said.

One year later, Martin, 30, and Wroblewski, 27, say the clinic has
helped them turn their lives around. They've been reunited with their
kids, Wroblewski is focusing on getting a college diploma and Martin
is making a living as a tattoo artist.

"The day that we lost our kids -- that's what started the wheels in
motion," Martin said.

"There was nothing more in the world I wanted than to get clean. I
tried before on my own, but I just blew it," Wroblewski said. She had
tried detox, but that didn't work. Methadone, the couple said, has
been their "saviour."

"We've had great support here. I can't say good enough things about
the people at the clinic," Martin said. "Now, we have a totally
different lifestyle."

Martin and Wroblewski are among the 460 patients attending the
Drouillard Road Clinic, which has been helping opiate addicts for the
past 11 years. The clinic is small and gets limited funding from the
government. About 70 people are on a waiting list.

Some may have given up waiting and left town in search of another
methadone program.

Others may have given up altogether.

When Ontario Addiction Treatment Centres, a private company based in
the Toronto area, quietly opened a new methadone clinic in west
Windsor at University and Elm avenues last week, area residents and
some local politicians were outraged that the group did not seek input
from the community first. Questions have also been raised about OATC's
practices. The company has been the target of numerous complaints and
investigations over the years, involving improper billing to OHIP and
two patient deaths in Ottawa and Toronto.

The controversy surrounding OATC has put a spotlight on opiate
addictions and methadone use in the city. Those who work with addicts
say more needs to be done to curb drug abuse and its consequences,
including violence, criminal activity and premature deaths.

Dr. Tony Hammer, a family physician who has been treating addicts at
the Drouillard Road Clinic since its inception, estimates the clinic's
methadone program takes care of about half the population in the
community needing the service. Another methadone program is offered
through Hotel-Dieu Grace Hospital, but it sees only between 15 and 20
people a week.

Some Windsor addicts have had to go to Hamilton or Brampton to enter a
methadone program, said Hammer, one of six physicians at the clinic
certified to prescribe methadone through the College of Physicians and
Surgeons of Ontario.

Clinic director Lynda Ruddock-Rousseau said it pains her when people
have to be turned away. There is only so much the staff and doctors
can do with one case manager and a cramped office, she said.

"There is a huge need for methadone in the community," she said,
adding that addicts come from all walks of life. "Teachers,
autoworkers, supervisors -- it can happen to anyone."

For Martin and Wroblewski, it began with legitimate use of Percocet, a
painkiller that took care of Martin's shoulder injury and Wroblewski's
back problems.

"Eventually, that just wasn't good enough so we were out on the street
looking for something bigger and better and this (Oxycontin) is what
came our way," Martin said.

"We would wake up thinking about how we would get it, when we would
get it," Wroblewski said. "It took over our life. We couldn't think
about anything else."

When Hammer first began working with the Drouillard Road Clinic 11
years ago, intravenous drug use was more common and heroin was a more
popular opioid, he said. But the increased use of narcotics in pain
management has changed that. People of all socioeconomic backgrounds
have become addicted to prescription drugs like OxyContin, either
taking them orally or crushing them up and snorting them. Such drugs
have also become very valuable commodities on the street. "It entraps
people easily," Hammer said.

The success of methadone "can't be ignored," he said. "In addiction
medicine, there is absolutely no question that it saves lives."

Hammer said methadone has a success rate of between 70 and 80 per
cent. The success rate of counselling alone is about five per cent, he
said.

"Some (addicts) have been in residential programs four, five, 10, 12
times -- over and over again and have relapsed," he said. "This is
very dangerous because these people are likely to die of an overdose."

At the Drouillard Road Clinic, patients must abide by strict rules,
which include providing urine samples so that doctors can be assured
they are not using illicit drugs while in treatment. Methadone is not
dispensed on site -- only prescriptions are handed out.

It takes about three weeks to stabilize a patient on methadone, Hammer
said.

Most people who approach the clinic are addicts who "perceive a
crisis," or are in the midst of one, such as losing a job, a home or a
spouse to drugs, he said.

Ruddock-Rousseau said lack of addiction treatment leads to criminal
behaviour and putting an addict through a methadone program is far
more beneficial and cost-effective than incarceration.

"It costs about $7,000 per year to send someone to a methadone
program. To send them to jail, it can cost between $30,000 and
$70,000," she said.

Marina Clemens, executive director of Drouillard Place, a service
centre for the Drouillard Road community, said education and open
communication is key to establishing a methadone clinic in any
neighbourhood.

She said many area residents were initially opposed to the Drouillard
Road Clinic, but grew to understand its role and purpose in the community.

"I truly don't believe that the methadone clinic has caused an
increase in prostitution and drug houses in the neighbourhood," she
said. "Just the whole proliferation of drugs and the access to them
has exacerbated that more than any clinic or any other service in the
community."

Clemens said she understands why neighbours are fearful of the new
methadone clinic in town, since OATC "didn't give any information and
they didn't do any education or let the people around them know what
they're up to."

Martin said the community also needs to be educated about the
all-consuming nature of addictions, in an effort to reduce
stereotyping and prejudice.

"To be honest with you ... we are always going to feel like misfits in
society because of the misconception that people who do drugs are
terrible people," he said.

"But that's not us."

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HOW IT WORKS

In the brains of addicts, methadone prevents heroin or morphine from
interacting with receptors for natural painkillers called endorphins,
blocking the effects of the addictive drugs and reducing the physical
cravings. In controlled doses it creates its own effects of mild
euphoria and drowsiness, but lasts much longer (one to two days) and
does not create the sometimes fatal respiratory depression that opiates do.

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