Colleges look at ways to tackle opioid epidemic

Monday
Jan 8, 2018 at 12:01 AM

By Jennifer SmolaThe Colum­bus Dis­patch

More than 4,300 Ohioans died of drug overdoses in 2016.

That’s nearly the size of this year’s entire freshman class at Ohio University.

That’s more than the number of graduates who received diplomas at Ohio State University’s fall commencement last month.

That’s almost double the entire undergraduate population at Otterbein University.

As the state and nation continue to grapple with a deadly opioid epidemic, higher education institutions in Ohio are hoping they can help work toward a solution.

They must, higher education leaders say.

"We’ve really made it a focus, just because the issue is so incredibly profound," said Randy Leite, Dean of Ohio University’s College of Health and Sciences and Professions at Ohio University. "We have, I would say, a moral obligation to try to respond to it."

Last year, the college Leite leads at OU launched Athens HOPE, a task force to fight the opioid epidemic through prevention and education. The group brings together local health and hospital officials, recovery services personnel, local government and law enforcement leaders, Athens Local Schools, and other community stakeholders to educate others about opioids, strengthen the community to support those in recovery and coordinate local services and resources.

The school also is sponsoring a team in the Ohio Opioid Technology Challenge, a state program offering money to attract ideas to help stem the crisis.

Last fall, Ohio State announced a new Opioid Innovation Fund, making more than $1 million in grants available to teams of Ohio State faculty and students to submit proposals with the goal of reducing the burden of Ohio’s opioid crisis. The idea came about after a similar effort to cross colleges and disciplines within the university to generate ideas about water quality following Toledo’s 2014 water crisis, said Ohio State Executive Vice President and Provost Bruce McPheron.

Along with the Opioid Innovation Fund, Ohio State has also initiated a new Drug Enforcement Policy Center and a number of other campus-wide initiatives to combat the opioid crisis.

Elsewhere in central Ohio, Otterbein University is in the process of submitting a grant proposal to raise awareness about misusing prescription drugs and the addiction that can follow. Capital University has hosted several information sessions and panels with community partners about the crisis.

Many of these efforts are in addition to programs already in place at universities to educate students on addiction and provide them with resources for fighting or treating addiction, such as Ohio State’s Collegiate Recovery Community that supports students in or seeking recovery from addiction.

Higher education leaders hope to collaborate. Ohio University and the University of Toledo recently entered into a partnership, the Ohio Alliance for Innovation in Public Health, to share research on health matters. The opioid epidemic is one of the partnership’s first focuses. OU has also joined the Ohio River Valley Addiction Research Consortium, a group of Appalachian universities focused on drug addiction research.

Higher education institutions are in a unique position to take a stab at a problem that continues to kill Ohioans and shatter families, leaders say.

"The university is really well-poised to take these great ideas by great thinkers and actually give our faculty and, in many cases, students, an outlet to see their creative ideas, their research, thoughts, actually begin to have a direct impact," McPheron said.

Everyone has a role in prevention, said Marcie Seidel, executive director at Prevention Action Alliance, a nonprofit Columbus prevention agency. Involving colleges is "a tremendous idea," she said.

"There is a lot of research that needs to be done around this," she said. "No one’s better equipped to do it than our talented universities."

Higher education institutions have both the social and human capital to solve complex problems, from their brain power to their strong research backgrounds, Leite said.

The opioid crisis has no boundaries. It affects any and all and crosses party lines, Leite added:

"Everyone knows it’s a problem. Higher education should be a part of the solution. If we’re not part of solving the state’s problems, we’re not achieving our fullest potential."

jsmola@dispatch.com

@jennsmola

Monday
Jan 8, 2018 at 12:01 AM

By Jennifer SmolaThe Colum­bus Dis­patch

More than 4,300 Ohioans died of drug overdoses in 2016.

That’s nearly the size of this year’s entire freshman class at Ohio University.

That’s more than the number of graduates who received diplomas at Ohio State University’s fall commencement last month.

That’s almost double the entire undergraduate population at Otterbein University.

As the state and nation continue to grapple with a deadly opioid epidemic, higher education institutions in Ohio are hoping they can help work toward a solution.

They must, higher education leaders say.

"We’ve really made it a focus, just because the issue is so incredibly profound," said Randy Leite, Dean of Ohio University’s College of Health and Sciences and Professions at Ohio University. "We have, I would say, a moral obligation to try to respond to it."

Last year, the college Leite leads at OU launched Athens HOPE, a task force to fight the opioid epidemic through prevention and education. The group brings together local health and hospital officials, recovery services personnel, local government and law enforcement leaders, Athens Local Schools, and other community stakeholders to educate others about opioids, strengthen the community to support those in recovery and coordinate local services and resources.

The school also is sponsoring a team in the Ohio Opioid Technology Challenge, a state program offering money to attract ideas to help stem the crisis.

Last fall, Ohio State announced a new Opioid Innovation Fund, making more than $1 million in grants available to teams of Ohio State faculty and students to submit proposals with the goal of reducing the burden of Ohio’s opioid crisis. The idea came about after a similar effort to cross colleges and disciplines within the university to generate ideas about water quality following Toledo’s 2014 water crisis, said Ohio State Executive Vice President and Provost Bruce McPheron.

Along with the Opioid Innovation Fund, Ohio State has also initiated a new Drug Enforcement Policy Center and a number of other campus-wide initiatives to combat the opioid crisis.

Elsewhere in central Ohio, Otterbein University is in the process of submitting a grant proposal to raise awareness about misusing prescription drugs and the addiction that can follow. Capital University has hosted several information sessions and panels with community partners about the crisis.

Many of these efforts are in addition to programs already in place at universities to educate students on addiction and provide them with resources for fighting or treating addiction, such as Ohio State’s Collegiate Recovery Community that supports students in or seeking recovery from addiction.

Higher education leaders hope to collaborate. Ohio University and the University of Toledo recently entered into a partnership, the Ohio Alliance for Innovation in Public Health, to share research on health matters. The opioid epidemic is one of the partnership’s first focuses. OU has also joined the Ohio River Valley Addiction Research Consortium, a group of Appalachian universities focused on drug addiction research.

Higher education institutions are in a unique position to take a stab at a problem that continues to kill Ohioans and shatter families, leaders say.

"The university is really well-poised to take these great ideas by great thinkers and actually give our faculty and, in many cases, students, an outlet to see their creative ideas, their research, thoughts, actually begin to have a direct impact," McPheron said.

Everyone has a role in prevention, said Marcie Seidel, executive director at Prevention Action Alliance, a nonprofit Columbus prevention agency. Involving colleges is "a tremendous idea," she said.

"There is a lot of research that needs to be done around this," she said. "No one’s better equipped to do it than our talented universities."

Higher education institutions have both the social and human capital to solve complex problems, from their brain power to their strong research backgrounds, Leite said.

The opioid crisis has no boundaries. It affects any and all and crosses party lines, Leite added:

"Everyone knows it’s a problem. Higher education should be a part of the solution. If we’re not part of solving the state’s problems, we’re not achieving our fullest potential."

jsmola@dispatch.com

@jennsmola