A new research project by a Wellington medical student aims to influence the behaviour of injecting drug users in New Zealand and prevent the spread of blood borne diseases.
Martin Woodbridge has been contracted by the Drugs, Health and Development Project to investigate ways health professionals can collaborate to reduce the harm caused by injecting drug use.
At less than one percent, New Zealand has one of the lowest rates of HIV infection amongst injecting drug users in the world and hepatitis C infection rates have fallen to 50 percent from 75 percent five years ago. These successes are credited to the Drugs, Health and Development Project set up by the government in 1989. The programme includes one-stop-shops providing new injecting equipment for users and a service for the safe collection and destruction of used needles. However, Woodbridge says while the one-stop-shop model has proven effective, the realities of constrictive health budgets and a finite health profession means a new re-focus of services is needed.
“The use of drugs by injection is no longer limited to heroin,” Woodbridge says. “New Zealand’s expanding drug market now includes pharmaceuticals, methamphetamine and steroids. With that variation comes a mixed group of users and the necessity of a diverse health response.”
Woodbridge says chaotic lifestyles, limited economic means and the stigma associated with intravenous drug use means most users do not go to traditional primary healthcare services such as the GP for advice or information. To ensure the harm caused by injecting drug use is reduced he says health services, including pharmacies, sexual health workers, Accident and Emergency professionals and needle exchange staff need to work in collaboration.
“The key aims of my project are to examine best practice and provide opportunity to understand and up-skill needle exchange programme workers, to explore opportunities for health services to improve engagement with people who inject drugs, and to explore practical responses to reducing the hepatitis C epidemic and other drug injecting health implications,” Woodbridge says.
Woodbridge is organising a workshop in August to up-skill health workers and to discuss better networking amongst health professionals with a focus on health promotion and reducing costs.