Local harm reduction advocates celebrated the first anniversary of the installation of a Narcan vending machine in Charleston on Monday.
An unassuming former newspaper box sits unlocked at a church on Charleston’s west side. On Monday afternoon, the box wore a happy birthday hat with a balloon tied to its handle.
The box is filled with Narcan, an opioid reversal drug that can stop an overdose. Also available in this box are drug testing strips and plan B emergency contraceptives.
It was the box’s first birthday and advocates gathered to celebrate with a party.
The event is meant as a beacon of hope and celebration with music, food, dancing and chalk drawings and messages like, “We love you” and “You are valuable.”
Chelsea Steelhammer is a volunteer with SOAR, a Charleston-based community group that says it promotes the health, dignity and voices of individuals who are impacted by drug use.
Steelhammer said the box has helped distribute 300 Narcan kits, each containing two doses, in the year it’s been installed.
“People can come and get it and there’s no questions asked, there’s no real stigma about just coming into a church parking lot, walking around, coming back out, nobody knows what you’re doing,” Steelhammer said. “And you can get things that might save your life or a loved one’s life.”
Steelhammer said people have a misconception about Narcan. She says it should be treated like any first aid item.
“They’re like, ‘I don’t use drugs,’ but it’s not for you, because you can’t use it on yourself,” Steelhammer said. “So, it’s, it’s just something to have in your first aid box.”
Gail Michelson is a volunteer with SOAR and a lawyer who has watched the opioid epidemic unfold throughout the legal system and in her community.
“When it all began to come out about how these pills became available to people legitimately,” Michelson said. “I thought they had started a whole epidemic here and that we must do everything we can to stop it and keep people alive.”
Michelson said the vending machines are a more accessible and realistic way for people who suffer from substance use disorder to obtain harm reduction tools.
“Because people don’t want to go in to pay $60 or even if it was free and go to their local pharmacist and go ‘Oh, do you use drugs?’ It’s a very nice and anonymous way to get it done,” Michelson said.
The box was installed by SOAR, using grant money from the Women’s Health Center and AIDs United. The Women’s Health Center in Charleston also has a Narcan vending machine.
“If you can reach out to SOAR, we could probably get you some funding or hook up with partnerships so that you will be able to be a community lifesaver as well,” Steelhammer said. “And even if you’re not interested in a whole box, but you want training or your church or business or organization, we can provide that for free so that you’re able to better serve your community.”
SOAR is working with CareSource, a health insurance agency, and other partners to place more than 50 naloxone vending machines across the eastern states, including West Virginia this year.
Appalachia Health News is a project of West Virginia Public Broadcasting with support from Marshall Health.
A peer recovery support specialist at a Marshall-based recovery program has won the Cornerstone Award.
A peer recovery support specialist at a Marshall-based recovery program has won the Cornerstone Award.
The award honors an individual or organization that has gone above and beyond to support students in recovery.
Aaron Blankenship is a West Virginia Collegiate Recovery Network (WVCRN) team member and recovery support specialist at Southern West Virginia Community and Technical College.
“Through his unwavering dedication and tireless efforts, Aaron Blankenship exemplifies the essence of the ARHE Cornerstone Award for Student Support,” said Dr. Pamela Alderman, president of Southern West Virginia Community and Technical College. “His commitment to going above and beyond in supporting students in recovery transforms lives and serves as a beacon of hope and inspiration for our community. We celebrate Aaron’s profound impact and recognize him as a cornerstone of support for those navigating the recovery journey.”
The WVCRN is housed within the Marshall University Research Corporation with support from the Marshall University Center of Excellence for Recovery.
Blankenship will accept his award at the National Collegiate Recovery Conference in San Diego, California this summer.
According to one of his peers, Hattie Newsome, student success coordinator for Southern West Virginia Community and Technical College, Blankenship’s own recovery gave him the empathy and drive to work passionately with students and the recovery community.
“He inspires those in recovery by showing them they can achieve sobriety, goals and their dreams can come true,” she said.
Advocates and recovery experts filled the capitol rotunda on Monday to educate lawmakers about substance use disorder.
One of the big issues facing people in recovery is reintegrating into society.
Nic Cochran is the director of Youth Services System, an organization that helps people in recovery reintegrate into society after incarceration or treatment at a rehab facility.
“We exclusively work with people who have a substance use disorder,” Cochran said. “But yes, recovery is a broad term because we also have to talk about reentry, the impacts of incarceration on the people with SUD (substance use disorder) is massive, we see so many people incarcerated.”
In a partnership with recovery homes and Uplift West Virginia, Youth Services System displayed a memorial to the people in the state lost to overdose.
“So we’re inviting people to write the names of anyone lost to overdose on the bricks, or to light a candle if they don’t feel comfortable writing the name,” Cochran said. “But the candles are also representing somebody who we wish was in recovery, or maybe somebody who used to be in recovery, or, or even people who are still in recovery, and we just want to celebrate that.”
Cochran said a big part of Recovery Day is to be a visible example for lawmakers to break down stigma.
“Substance use disorder is criminalized so heavily,” Cochran said. “We really need additional support in order to recover, in order to have treatment and to be rehabilitated so that we can become contributing members of society. So if I had anything to say to legislators, that’s what it would be, you know, we’re people, please treat us like people. And let’s get over the stigma.”
The West Virginia Drug Intervention Institute was also featured at Recovery Day. Their receptionist, Rhiannon Wiseman, said she was there to educate the public and lawmakers about the One Box.
“The One Box is an opioid overdose response kit. You open it up, it’ll walk you through an overdose step by step,” Wiseman said. “Now whether you, a lot of people, can’t respond to an overdose or any traumatic circumstances – they kind of freak out. There’s no guesswork. It walks you right through it.”
Wiseman said it is important to have harm reduction resources like One Box available everywhere.
“Opioid overdose can happen absolutely anywhere in homes, businesses, schools, libraries, doctor’s office, it doesn’t matter,” Wiseman said. “They happen everywhere now.”
Wiseman added that Naloxone, or Narcan, is safe for everyone and encouraged others to be trained in administering the opioid overdose reversal drug.
In the mountains of Eastern Kentucky, jobs are scarce, and an opioid crisis continues to inflict pain throughout the region. But where many see hopelessness, Doug Naselroad, a master luthier from Hindman, Kentucky, sees an opportunity to help those in need.
In the mountains of Eastern Kentucky, jobs are scarce, and an opioid crisis continues to inflict pain throughout the region. But where many see hopelessness, Doug Naselroad, a master luthier from Hindman, Kentucky, sees an opportunity to help those in need.
Naselroad founded a nonprofit instrument manufacturer, The Troublesome Creek Stringed Instrument Company, to train and employ people in recovery, helping them find purpose and belonging as they work their way through recovery.
This short film explores Doug’s mission and the positive impact he and his team have had on a region and its people.
Watch this special Folkways story below:
The Troublesome Creek Stringed Instrument Company strives to make beautiful handcrafted instruments, including dulcimers, guitars and mandolins.
Credit: Curren Sheldon/West Virginia Public BroadcastingTroublesome Creek employee Anthony works on a guitar.
Credit: Curren Sheldon/West Virginia Public BroadcastingFounder and master luthier Doug Naselroad checks the sound of a guitar in progress.
Credit: Curren Sheldon/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
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This story is part of the Inside Appalachia Folkways Reporting Project, a partnership with West Virginia Public Broadcasting’s Inside Appalachia and the Folklife Program of the West Virginia Humanities Council.
The Folkways Reporting Project is made possible in part with support from Margaret A. Cargill Philanthropies to the West Virginia Public Broadcasting Foundation. Subscribe to the podcast to hear more stories of Appalachian folklife, arts and culture.
On this West Virginia Week, we hear about some of the health challenges facing West Virginians — including lung disease, HIV/AIDS outbreaks and recovery.
On this West Virginia Week, we hear about some of the health challenges facing West Virginians — including lung disease, HIV/AIDS outbreaks and recovery.
We also learn how to meet the challenges of the holidays with aging family members.
Chris Schulz is our host this week. Our theme music is by Matt Jackfert.
West Virginia Week is a web-only podcast that explores the week’s biggest news in the Mountain State. It’s produced with help from Bill Lynch, Briana Heaney, Caroline MacGregor, Chris Schulz, Curtis Tate, Emily Rice, Eric Douglas, Liz McCormick, and Randy Yohe.
Kim Holstein is the lead for the Quick Response Team — an organization with Boone County Health — that follows up with people who are struggling with addiction in the community. A cardiac arrest call was dispatched, but since Narcan was given, they will follow up within 48 hours to see if the individual will consider going to a substance use treatment center.
Kimberly Holstein’s morning starts off by comparing charts turned in by first responders. Every day she arrives at the office, located in the Boone County Health Department, before anyone. She sips coffee, and compares two spreadsheets.
She looks for signs of a drug related call. She points to an EMS call dispatched for cardiac arrest, but then discovers that on the Narcan report, it shows Narcan was administered at that address shortly after the call.
She said this is common because people are too ashamed or afraid to admit that the call is for an overdose.
“I think it’s also just the stigma of being truthful with the situation in your home, especially for a parent,” Holstein said. “What parent wants to call 911 and say that their son is unconscious in the bathroom, and that they are using heroin in your home? That’s probably a really hard phone call for a mother to make.”
For Holstein, this work is personal. Her step-daughter and brother suffer from addiction to opioids.
Credit: Briana Heaney/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Holstein is the lead for the Quick Response Team (QRT) — an organization with Boone County Health — that follows up with people who are struggling with addiction in the community. For the cardiac arrest call, since Narcan was given, they will follow up within 48 hours to see if the individual will consider going to a substance use treatment center.
They also receive recommendations to check on people from police officers or community members who witness signs of drug use.
The Team
At 8 a.m., the peer support team comes in and circles up for a morning meeting. Holstein tells them where and who they need to go check in on. Many of them are in recovery themselves, and they are all from Boone County.
Barry Stowers, one of the peer support specialists, is an animated guy, with glasses and a beard.
“I feel like we’re kind of like a middleman, we exist to help connect people to the type of treatment that they need,” Stowers said. “We follow up on these overdoses and they don’t always take us up on the first time around. But that’s why we meet with them multiple times.”
Casie Dillon (left) and Barry Stowers (right) both work on the quick response team. They are both in recovery from opioid addiction. They said this work takes a toll on them but is gratifying when they can help someone.
Credit: Briana Heaney/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
He and the five-person team travel around the county handing out food, Narcan, hygiene supplies — and they talk to people about options for recovery.
“If they say that they’re fine with us coming back, we kind of put them in the driver’s seat. So we don’t force them to do anything that they don’t want to do. But we let them know there’s options,” Stowers said.
That day, they visit the man who overdosed the night before and received Narcan. Holstein knew him and calls to talk to him. The QRT had taken him to a treatment facility before. It wasn’t a good fit, he tells her, because it was a hospital and he had a lot of stress from being in the hospital before. But he said he was ready to try a new place, so she tells the QRT about their discussion in that morning’s meeting.
“Called him with no answer,” she explains to the team. “But it doesn’t mean he backed out because the last conversation I had with him on the phone was to go ahead and take a shower and start getting ready, because we’re gonna figure out a bed [for him] no matter what.”
The team heads out to talk to him, and possibly take him to a substance use facility. These things are tentative Holstein said, he could back out. Holstein opens his file and writes that, for future reference — he does not want to go to a hospital.
The team works with people’s preferences and takes them places they will feel comfortable. They never send someone to a place they have not checked out themselves.
“It’s really important we vet the facility before we take someone from our community there,” Holstein said.
Boone County has nearly 21,000 people and 508 square miles. These binders break it down to four zones. They keep track of who is where, and what they need. It’s where Kim writes down preferences of community members they have worked with.
Credit: Briana Heaney/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
The Courts
Holstein then goes to the county courthouse. She works closely with the courts, advocating for, and weighing in on, court decisions for people the QRT is trying to help.
“So this last year the magistrate court here in Boone County, between Magistrate [Danny] Moore and Magistrate [Niel] Burnside, has allowed us to send 59 people to treatment through their courtroom,” Hostien said.
This morning she has a meeting with Moore. He said working with QRT has given him more options for rehabilitation for some of the people he sees in his courts – and has helped the community in doing so.
“Allowing them to step in and offer help has made a tremendous turnaround,” Moore said. “That’s the reason why you see some of the numbers going down in this county.”
In this meeting, Moore and Holstein figure out a plan for one of the people in the court system, to have charges dropped if she graduates from her rehabilitation facility.
“He told her that if she graduated with no issues that he would consider wiping that out because it was trespassing. She’s estimated to be [graduated by] Dec. 27,” Holstein said.
The Police
Holstein leaves the magistrate court and heads to the sheriff’s office for a meeting with Sheriff Chad Barker. They discuss different families and people in the area.
Barker said the QRT has worked with the police force and helped change attitudes about drug use in the area. He said at first officers were hesitant about the QRT, and it was hard to get every officer to carry Narcan with them. Now, officers are happy to work with QRT and reach out to them often.
This is one of the vehicles the team takes out.
Credit: Briana Heaney/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
At the end of the meeting, Barker asks Holstein to check on a woman in the community he saw when responding to a call at a house down the street. Barker said the woman looks like she may be in crisis.
Holstein heads down there. The woman doesn’t answer, so they leave a note on her door handle. If she needs anything, she can call them.
The Money
The QRT team is entirely grant funded. Holstein found out earlier that day that the team received a grant to fund transportation for people coming out of recovery. Soon the QRT will be able to give rides to doctor’s appointments, prescription fills or jobs.
Holstein wants the QRT to be able to do more to help keep people off drugs and to help prevent drug use in the area through education. But they need more money to do it.
One option is the $1 billion opioid settlement money coming to the state. Boone County expects $2 million to $3 million, according to West Virginia First settlement documents.
A bulletin board featuring photographs of the many efforts of Boone County’s QRT workers.
Credit: Briana Heaney/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
“I hate how this money came about, and that so many people lost their lives for this money to be available,” Holstein said. “On the other hand, I have to look at how many lives can change because of that.”
Holstein said the next step for the QRT is to focus on more assistance for those coming out of rehab by strengthening programs that connect them to housing and jobs, and even access to mental health care.
“We’re gonna keep them in sobriety for X amount of time. But where are they gonna go past that? Once that court case is over? What options do we have?” She said, “Right now, our county has none.”
Many families in Boone County have been affected by the opioid epidemic. Holstein said it’s not uncommon for a child to be living in a home with a family member who is struggling with addiction.
“We also need to focus on just the mental health side. These kids, they have PTSD. They went through addiction with their family, sometimes multiple generations of addiction. They have experienced the worst of the worst,” Holstein said.
Boone County QRT won the West Virginia Exemplary Program of the year by West Virginia Department of Health and Human Resources.
Credit: Briana Heaney/West Virginia Public Broadcasting
Between 2014 and 2020, Boone County was at the epicenter of the opioid epidemic, with one in four residents holding an opioid prescription.
The West Virginia First Foundation, which is responsible for distributing the money from the opioid settlement, had its first meeting Nov. 6.
The Winding Road Back
On the drive back to the office, a little red Volkswagen bug stops in the middle of the street. Holstein stops, too.
Out of the Volkswagen came a tall young man, with dark blond hair. He looks back at Holstein, his arms open in an embrace.
“I’m headed down to the courthouse,” the man said. “I got to head down to the courthouse and get my dismissal papers.” This is Hunter Gillispie — he’s someone the QRT helped into recovery.
“Okay good deal, see you soon!” Holstein said as they exchanged a hug and held up traffic for a few seconds.
Both Gillispie’s parents were addicted to opioids. As a teenager, he had been shot in the face by his uncle in a dispute over drugs.
After their embrace, they both get back in their vehicles.
“Him and his sister went through recovery at the same time,” Holstein said. “They are the first ones in three generations who’ve made it.”
Now, Gillispie is a year sober and works on a river boat. Holstein said he is one of QRT’s success stories. She said people like him are why she works so hard everyday to expand her program.
