The Nurse's Role
When it comes to lessening the personal and social harms associated with problematic substance use, harm reduction strategies represent this
What is a ‘best practice’ approach?
Established during England’s HIV crisis in the 1980’s, this became the foundation for harm reduction interventions today
What is the Mersey Harm Reduction Model?
This is the health region with the highest reported rates of overdose deaths in BC, at 44/100,000 people.
What is Northern Health?
Another name for a Safe Use Site
What is a Supervised Consumption Site?
Medically, this synthetic opioid is used as an analgesic, but has been contaminating illegally used drugs and caused fatal
What is Fentanyl?
Harm reduction demonstrates this by recognizing the dependent effects of addiction and designing systems of support to manage community health.
What is Critical Thought?
This class of drugs has strong analgesic effects from triggering the release of endorphins. They may be prescribed following a surgery or to manage chronic pain
What are opioids?
These are the cities experiencing the highest number of unregulated drug deaths so far in 2025 in British Columbia.
What is Vancouver, Surrey, and Greater Victoria?
A drug checking method that tests for the presence of Fentanyl or Benzodiazepines by mixing a small amount of substance with water, to provide a reading wherein two lines indicate a negative test result.
What is a test strip?
This synthetic drug rapidly reverses the depressive effects of opioids on the central nervous system by blocking opiate receptors.
What is naloxone?
This is a job title for those providing wound care, STI testing, adult immunizations, and harm reduction supplies at Safe Use Sites.
What is a nurse?
This is the year that British Columbia's Provincial Health Officer declared a public health emergency related to opioid-related overdose deaths
What is 2016?
T/F: Abstinence-only approaches are what we presently use at harm reduction sites
False
The association that describes substance use disorder as “a health issue rather than a moral issue”
What is FNHA (First Nations Health Authority)?
This class of central nervous system depressants may be used as sedatives or to treat anxiety disorders. They have been implicated in BC overdoses. Examples include Valium and xanax.
What are Benzodiazepines?
This service provides telephone consultation to connect health care providers to an Addiction Medicine Specialist who has expertise and knowledge in addiction medicine (including emergency, acute, and community care).
What is the 24/7 Addiction Medicine Clinician Support Line?
Where the first Safe Use Site opened in Canada in the year 2003
What is Vancouver?
The provinces that have experienced the most occurrences of opioid overdoses in the past year
What are BC, Alberta, and Ontario?
An organization that offers online videos, manuals, and a naloxone 101 course for naloxone administration and recognizing the signs of an overdose
What is TowardTheHeart (with the BCCDC)?
This long-acting synthetic opioid binds to opioid receptors without creating a “high,” and is therefore used to manage withdrawal symptoms.
What is methadone?
BC health care providers are encouraged to join these sessions, which are focused on helping primary health care providers and their teams build capacity in the treatment and management of substance use disorders.
What is BC ECHO on substance sessions?
The year that represented a shift away from abstinence-only approaches towards harm reduction
What is the 1980's?
The leading cause of death among 15-18-year-olds in BC in 2021
What is unregulated drug toxicity?
This project worked directly with peer and experiential workers to develop supports for them
What is the Peer2Peer Project?
This is the most widely prescribed form of opioid in Canada, often combined with acetaminophen for pain management.
What is codeine?