There is a tendency for people who are deeply involved with drugs or alcohol to pile up a huge list of substance abuse-related problems. When people are abusing drugs like prescription painkillers and heroin, some of the problems can reach as far as a drug overdose. It’s important for us to be careful about assuming people who overdose are all long time substance abusers.
It’s possible they simply don’t know how to judge the amount and effects of the drugs they are taking early in the substance abuse process. Just the same, people who overdose on drugs typically have to carry that scar with them for the rest of their lives. If you have a prior overdose in your past, it’s a clear indication your addiction is causing you problems. Those problems go far beyond the personal issues people face when they end up living in the cycle of addiction. Overdose is a problem that puts one’s life directly at risk. The fact you are reading this information indicates that your addiction is still an issue, but perhaps you are thinking about getting help. We certainly hope that is the case.
If it is, then a rehab facility like ours is where you belong. As you enter rehab, you will need to talk about your addiction history with the rehab facility’s administrative staff. It’s their responsibility to collect information about you and your addiction. With that information, they can decide what type of addiction treatment services you might need. During the intake interview, it’s very important that you be totally honest with the staff. That includes you going so far as to give details about a prior overdose. Why is this information relevant? It’s quite possible that the circumstances behind your overdose will change the direction of your treatment program.
By the way, you need to be clear about whether the overdose was accidental or intentional. It’s very important information that the rehab’s staff members need to know. As we already stated, it’s very likely that your prior overdose will dictate how the staff designs your treatment. We will discuss that more in the next section.
How a Prior Overdose Could Affect Your Treatment Plan
In our Ohio inpatient drug rehab, we have a responsibility to make sure all of our clients get the proper level of care. Of course, that includes you. On its own, the fact you have experienced an overdose won’t really affect how we put your treatment plan together. In fact, we will use a number of factors to determine the proper course of treatment. Here is a list of criteria we might find relevant to your situation:
- The timing and the circumstances surrounding your overdose or overdoses
- The length of time you have been abusing substances
- The substance or substances you have been abusing
- The frequency of your substance abuse
- The amount of drugs you consume within a specified period of time
- The current state of your health
If all of these factors point to the fact you’re dealing with a severe addiction problem, we will react accordingly. What does that mean? When someone almost loses their life because of drugs, we have a responsibility to do all we can to make sure it never happens again. We can do that in several ways. First, we can make sure you have sufficient time to fully detox past your withdrawal symptoms.
We might even go so far as to put extra emphasis on your overall health through nutrition and exercise. When it’s time for therapy, we would want to employ all the resources we have towards trying to find out the driving force behind your substance abuse. As part of the overall treatment process, we might strongly suggest that you commit to treatment for as long as 90 to 180 days. The bottom line is this. We will want to do everything we can to make sure that when you leave rehab, you have the resources and coping skills you need to stay away from drugs. That’s how you avoid additional overdoses in the future.
Whether you have an overdose in your past or not is irrelevant. What matters the most is you getting treatment before something really goes awry. There is no coming back from a death caused by overdose. When you are ready to commit to treatment, we want you to let us help you. You can reach us by calling 833-820-2922 as soon as possible.