Naloxone administration by nonmedical providers- a descriptive study of County sheriff department training

THE STUDY BACKGROUND: In 2015 a county sheriff department in Michigan began a training program for its deputies on administration of naloxone for non-medical providers. METHODS: A descriptive analysis was used to evaluate the effectiveness of the program. Data collected from the Sheriff’s department allowed the study to quantify the incidence of naloxone administration, describe characteristics related to the administration, and report on aggregate outcomes. RESULTS: Of the reported 184 incidents involving naloxone use the sheriff department had an overall successful administration rate of 94.6% in the cases from 2015 to 2017. It was also noted that the overall number of naloxone administrations showed an upward trend with a greater number of trained deputies. CONCLUSION: The outcome of training non-medical first responders in naloxone administration has been shown to be successful with regard to resuscitation of patients with opioid overdose.