Interact for Health has awarded a $30,000 grant to REACH for Tomorrow to provide Children of Trauma Training to all five Highland County public school districts, Head Start, and Highland County Christian Academy.
Children of Trauma lays the foundation that supports the evidence-based structured sensory interventions developed by TLC, trauma and loss in children. Their research was completed in school and agency settings to ensure the actual programs could be supported in the environments where children are accessible. In addition to the trauma training, REACH will privide each school district with a demonstration of My Generation Rx to a high school class to assist with their drug prevention instruction about the importance of using medication safely, as well as teaching teens key skills to turn down invitations to misuse and positive alternatives to cope with the demands of life. These materials could be delivered in formal classroom settings, after-school programming, youth organization meetings, or any other venue with teen audiences.
A community training will also be held for adults at the Highland County Senior Citizens Center as part of this grant from Generation Rx.
The mission of Generation Rx is to educate people of all ages about the potential dangers of misusing prescription medications. In doing so, the program strives to enhance medication safety among youth, college students, other adults, and seniors. Prescription medications can help us live longer and healthier lives, but any medication has the potential to do harm – especially when misused.
Since 2009, the College of Pharmacy at The Ohio State University and the Cardinal Health Foundation have partnered to provide open source educational materials that anyone can use to help prevent the misuse of prescription drugs.
The core messages are:
• Only use prescription medications as directed by a health professional.
• Never share your prescription medications with others or use someone else’s medications.
• Always store your medications securely to prevent others from taking them, and properly dispose of medications that you no longer need.
• Be a good example to those around you by modeling these safe medication-taking practices and discussing the dangers of misusing prescription drugs with your family, friends, colleagues, students or patients.
The last piece of this grant is to provide free Naloxone training to the community and is done through a partnership with the Highland County Health Department. Trainings will be held at Greater Life Assembly, Emmanuel Christian Church and Carpenters House of Prayer.
Naloxone is a medication designed to rapidly reverse opioid overdose. It is an opioid antagonist – meaning that it binds to opioid receptors and can reverse and block the effects of other opioids. It can very quickly restore normal respiration to a person whose breathing has slowed or stopped as a result of overdosing with heroin or prescription opioid pain medications.
Submitted by Interact for Health.
