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In Late 2014, NOVAS Initiatives won an award for the Best Patient Lifestyle Education Project at the Irish Healthcare Awards ceremony held in Dublin.

NOVAS Initiatives, one of the largest homeless providers in the state, recently won the category for projects that promote healthy lifestyle and patient education, with a view to improving the health of at-risk populations, at the Irish Healthcare The project, entitled, HEADS UP: Preventing and Responding to Overdose in McGarry House was commissioned to tackle the level of overdose among the homeless population in one of its Limerick services, McGarry House. This is a low-threshold facility that provides temporary supported accommodation to 30 male and female residents.

Michael Goulding, NOVAS CEO, noted that the award ‘is not only recognition for the work NOVAS does to combat the issue but more importantly a recognition of the scourge of overdose among the most vulnerable groups in our society. More people die in Ireland each year from overdose than road traffic accidents, yet it fails to reach the political agenda. We hope this research will help to highlight the issue so that a consorted and pro-active response by government and the relevant agencies can be pursued.’

Research was undertaken by Quality Matters and the Graduate Entry Medical School University of Limerick. It was found that almost three quarters of the people who had participated in the research had previously overdosed, most within the last year, and 93% had witnessed an overdose, again most within the last year. Benzodiazepines and heroin were the drugs most frequently used by those interviewed, with one-fifth of the cohort injecting daily.

‘We commissioned this research because nothing like this had been done before in Ireland’, Anne Cronin, Head of Homeless Services with NOVAS explained, ‘People are dying unnecessarily from overdoses in Limerick and all over Ireland. These deaths are preventable. This research helps us understand our residents’ experiences, and how our residents and staff can prevent overdose, and can best respond to it when it happens to stop it becoming fatal’.

In the 18 months prior to the research there was an overdose every two weeks, on average, in McGarry House.’ The staff were responding effectively, but we knew there was more to learn’ said Anne, ‘We needed to find out why such levels of overdose were happening among our clients and the best possible ways we could respond. We felt an independent review was the most effective way to do this.’

A multi-agency response to the issue is one of the key recommendations emerging from the report. It also recommended first aid and overdose response training for homeless people. A link between poor mental health and overdose was clearly identified, with more than 50% of the participants indicating that they had been in a particularly bad place immediately prior to their last overdose. The recommendations also made specific reference to supporting high-risk pregnant drug using women.

A peer overdose training project led by NOVAS and our partners is under development and will be delivered to homeless people throughout the country when completed.