Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs Secretary Dr. Latika Davis-Jones, second from left, receives feedback from local drug treatment program providers and government officials during panel discussion Wednesday at the RISE Center in Reading. (DAVID MEKEEL – READER EAGLE)
Dr. Latika Davis-Jones knows that the path to addiction recovery is difficult, not only for those who travel it, but also for those who guide them along the way.
This is why the Pennsylvania Department of Drug and Alcohol Programs the secretary stopped in Reading Wednesday morning. She led a panel discussion at the RISE Center on North Eighth Street to get feedback from those dedicated to providing people with the tools to fight addiction.
The visit marked the start of the second phase of a statewide stakeholder tour that the Secretary is embarking on. The first phase saw her visit 17 counties last fall and winter.
The goal of this ongoing tour is for the Secretary to hear from those on the front lines about what the department can do to make their jobs easier and more effective.
“All of us in this room are rooted in the same cause, which is to help people,” she said.
Davis-Jones invited those gathered for the event – representatives of local drug treatment and prevention providers, state and local governments, and community groups – to share their concerns and the issues they consider as obstacles to helping those who need it.
“I’m here to listen,” she said. “I’m here to observe. I am here to learn.
The main topic of discussion was regulation, a subject that the secretary said she knows very well and which needs to be addressed.
“To say we are long overdue to update our regulations is an understatement,” she said. “Some of them are over 50 years old.”
One of the regulations repeatedly mentioned as needing to be changed concerned updating patient treatment plans.
Bonnie Triebig, clinical director of Berks Counseling Center, said her staff has struggled to meet the requirement to update treatment plans every 60 days.
“We end up spending more time updating treatment plans than actually doing the treatment,” she said.
The burden can be even greater for short-term accommodation facilities, whose representatives say they must update treatment plans every 15 days, even if the patient only stays with them for a short time .
They suggested that plans should not be required to be updated unless a patient stays more than 30 days.
The secretary was receptive to the comments, saying she would study the feasibility of creating more flexibility in the requirements.
Training requirements were another hot topic.
Scott Althouse, executive director of Easy Does It Inc., said some of his staff, particularly new hires, have struggled to complete all of the required training they need to be able to perform their work during the time they devote. assigned.
Some training, he said, must be completed within 90 hours of hire. And too often, training programs are infrequent and fill up too quickly.
And many of the training requirements actually have little to do with an employee’s day-to-day job, he added.
Other participants said training programs often end up with hundreds of people on waiting lists hoping to secure one of the few spots available. They also said the amount of training required is a burden, requiring hours and hours of valuable staff time.
The secretary said one solution could be to hold on-site trainings, where the department could visit a local program and train the entire staff at the same time. She also said she would review the timelines required for some training.
Other topics of discussion at Wednesday’s event included easing the burden of mandatory data reporting; relax confidentiality rules so that providers can work better together; address inequalities in health care; and potentially create a statewide system that would show in real time how many beds providers have open.
This last subject caught the attention of many participants.
They said finding a bed for someone in need of treatment had long been a difficult task, with dire consequences if it failed.
“If I can’t find them a bed, I lose them to the street, I lose them to God knows what,” said Jay Ostrich, director of the Berks County Veterans Service Center.
Having a way to quickly and easily locate open beds would make a world of difference, participants said. That is, provided that suppliers are able to keep the data up to date.
“If this works, what a godsend it will be,” said Dan Milloy, executive director of the Treatment Access & Services Center Inc. of Berks County.
