(DECEMBER 30, 2024) Larner Associate Professor of Emergency Medicine Daniel Wolfson, M.D., M.S., the state’s EMS medical director, commented for a Vermont Public story on a new initiative launched in the state’s largest city that allows first responders to administer opioid addiction treatment medication at the scene of overdoses.
Daniel Wolfson, M.D., M.S., associate professor of emergency medicine at the University of Vermont and the state’s EMS medical director
(DECEMBER 30, 2024) Vermont Public reports that the state’s largest city has launched a new initiative that allows first responders to administer opioid addiction treatment medication at the scene of overdoses.
It’s an approach that some states have tried in recent years. And research indicates it’s an effective way to get more people who struggle with opioid misuse into treatment.
Overdoses have skyrocketed in Burlington in recent years: As of mid-November, the city’s fire department had already responded to 555 overdoses in 2024—that’s three and a half times as many as five years ago.
At the same time, more people are refusing to be transported by EMTs to the hospital after they’ve been revived from the overdose, which means they’re not getting follow-up care, or a chance to get funneled into addiction treatment.
“It’s a missed opportunity,” said Daniel Wolfson, M.D., M.S., associate professor of emergency medicine at the University of Vermont and the state’s EMS medical director. “In the emergency department, we will connect them with opportunities for ongoing treatments and care, like starting them on buprenorphine or methadone, but if they don’t come into the ED, they’re not getting that.”
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