Officers with the Poplar Bluff Police Department and Butler County Sheriff's Department now are carrying an antidote for opioid overdoses in their patrol vehicles.
This comes after officers from both departments received training Tuesday on the use of Narcan at Key Drugs by Pharmacist Marty Michel and Dr. Christopher Pinderski with Black River Medical Center. Poplar Bluff Deputy Police Chief Donnie Trout indicated at least 40 officers attended.
The officers, Trout said, left with doses of the drug, which were provided by Scott Preslar and Butler County EMS.
"The need for this arose from the increase in opioid overdoes and heroin overdoses here in town, and of course, the county," Trout said.
The training, he said, provided officers with information regarding what to look for in an overdose, what the symptoms are and how to administer a dose of the nasal spray Narcan.
"It's a very simple nasal spray; it has one dose in it," Trout said.
The drug can be administered in either nostril and starts working within one to two minutes, Trout said.
"We have an advantage here in town that both ambulance services are so close; they have it on the ambulances (but) sometimes an ambulance is not available," Trout sad.
City detectives, supervisors, administration and patrol officers attended the training, Trout said.
The Narcan, Trout said, will be carried by patrol and narcotics supervisors. One dose also will be available in the booking room.
"We sent everybody that we could" from the sheriff's department, including both the full-time registered nurse, as well as the part-time nurse, road deputies and supervisors, said Chief Deputy Wes Popp.
"(The Narcan) will be distributed to the lieutenant on down to the sergeants, corporals," Popp said. "We will give it to the road guys daily."
Unlike in the city, Popp said, the deputies are spread out while they are on duty.
If the supervisor has the drug, and a road officer needs it on the other end of the county, time becomes an issue, Popp said.
"We are going to have it for everybody," Popp said.
The Narcan, according to police Chief Danny Whiteley, also is available at Key Drugs for any individual who might want to have it available at home.
The purpose of the Narcan at the departments, Trout said, is for citizen overdoses, but it might be needed for officers should they come into skin contact with Fentanyl.
An opioid, Fentanyl is a time-release patch, but users "melt it to get all the (medication) out of it," Trout said.
Contact with the drug could cause an officer "to drop," Popp said.
The officers said their departments were approached by Butler County EMS personnel, Pinderski and Michel about doing the training.
Pinderski, Trout said, is an emergency room doctor.
"He sees this first hand, and he saw the need," Trout said.
When administered, Popp said, the Narcan is temporary and only lasts about an hour.
The person, he said, still needs to be evaluated by medical personnel.
"We have probably on average two to three overdoses a week that are saved when paramedics" administer the drug, said Trout.
The need for the Narcan, Whiteley said, substantiates the "harrowing problem we have in the Poplar Bluff area" with opioid abuse.
"We started talking about meth way before it became a problem, and this is the same thing," Whiteley said.
Popp agreed.
"We've got to be one step ahead all the time," Popp said.
When methamphetamine was rampant, cities like Poplar Bluff passed ordinances requiring a prescription for the purchase of pseudoephedrine, which decreased the manufacturing, Whiteley said.
Cooks, Popp said, then moved to a one-pot method for cooking meth, but manufacturing has lessened.
"This is the next challenge," Popp said.
Whiteley is hopeful a bill by Missouri Rep. Holly Rehder, R-Sikeston, which would create a prescription-drug monitoring program, becomes law this year. The bill would create a statewide database to track addictive prescription drugs, like the opioids.
Rehder, Whiteley said, has not given up and has had the fortitude to do the right thing and keep fighting for the program.
As the officers continue to combat the opioid abuse, "we're thankful to Dr. Pinderski, Marty Michel and Scott Preslar, everybody who stepped up" to help, Trout said.
Having the Narcan available has "given us a tool to help save lives on the road," Popp said.