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Oxford County Recognizes International Overdose Awareness Day

Tuesday, 1 September 2015 05:27

Oxford County Public Health is hoping to break the stigma surrounding drug related deaths.

OXFORD COUNTY - International Overdose Awareness day hopes to save lives.

Oxford County Public Health is observing the worldwide day drawing attention to the dangers of overdosing on any kind of medication or drug.

Public Health Nurse Lisa Gillespie says one way to help prevent this from happening is keeping those medications out of the hands of people who do not need to be using them. "You should always return any unused portions of a prescription back to a pharmacy, whether it's an opiate, or an antibiotic or any type of medication. It should always be returned."

Overdosing could happen to anyone - Gillespie says there is no one group that is more at risk than another. "It's obviously important to only use medications that are prescribed to you, as they are prescribed. So don't take extra without consulting your physician. You want to keep all of your medication safely locked away in your medicine cabinet away from children, and never use a prescription that is not yours."

The global day of recognition hopes to ease some of the stigma surrounding drug related deaths. Gillespie encourages anyone who might be suffering from addiction to reach out and find help. "Addiction Services of Thames Valley is certainly a good place for people to go. At the Health Unit we have what's called the Take Home the Naloxone program. So in that program we teach people that are at risk for an opium overdose how to prevent an overdose in the first place, to look for signs and symptoms of a potential overdose, and how to reverse an overdose."

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