Harm Reduction Basics
A technique in harm reduction which involves collecting used needles from drug users and providing them with sterile needles
What is syringe exchange?
Engaging local leaders and developing community-driven harm reduction programs helps build this crucial element between service providers and communities.
What is Trust?
What's the first thing to do if you suspect someone may have overdosed?
Check for breathing
True or False: Harm reduction strategies, such as needle exchanges, increase drug use in the community rather than decrease it.
False
(Potier et al., 2014)
A common harm reduction service that prevents the spread of infections among people who inject drugs.
What is safe supply?
Acknowledging these beliefs can make harm reduction services more effective, especially when working with faith-based organizations.
What are religion and spiritual beliefs?
How can drug users use more safely?
Use with a friend, keep naloxone nearby, start small and increase doses / hits
True or False: Individuals participating in harm reduction programs are not interested in recovery and prefer to continue using substances indefinitely.
False
(Thompson et al., 2023)
This harm reduction strategy involves providing safe spaces where individuals can use drugs under medical supervision to prevent overdose.
What are supervised injection sites?
Tailoring harm reduction efforts to meet this reality, which includes addressing financial barriers, ensures that services are accessible to low-income communities.
What are economic disparities?
What drug, which cannot be reversed by naloxone, is often mixed with fentanyl?
Benzodiazepines
True or False: Harm reduction approaches, such as safe consumption sites, do not increase drug use but instead lower overdose deaths and connect individuals to treatment services.
True
(Thompson et al., 2023)
This type of care encourages small, incremental steps towards improved health and reducing risk of harm from drug use.
What is harm reduction?
This type of trauma, often experienced by Indigenous and marginalized communities, requires harm reduction efforts to address past injustices.
What is historical and intergenerational trauma?
Workers with lived experience are sometimes referred to as...
Peer workers
True or False: Providing naloxone leads to riskier drug use behaviors because users feel they can use more freely without consequences.
False
(Jones et al., 2017)
This life-saving medication is often provided in harm reduction kits to reverse opioid overdoses.
What is naloxone?
This factor refers to the negative beliefs held by some communities towards substance use, making individuals hesitant to seek harm reduction services.
What is Stigma?
This type of counseling is often paired with harm reduction approaches to increase motivation and readiness for change.
What is motivational interviewing?
True or False: Harm reduction approaches are only effective for certain types of drug users, particularly those addicted to opioids, and not for others.
False
(Ritter & Cameron, 2006)