New clinic offers rapid response to addicts
The city’s hospital has opened a new clinic downtown for people addicted to alcohol or opioids.
The Rapid Access Addiction Medicine (RAAM) clinic offers same-day counselling as well as addiction medication and prescription therapies. Patients are then connected with the bestsuited ongoing care provider.
The clinic is in the same building as PARN – Peterborough Aids Resource Network at 159 King St. It shares a space with another clinic in suite 302.
No appointment or physician referral is needed for RAAM, however, referrals are welcome.
The clinic is staffed by employees of Peterborough Regional Health Centre (PRHC) and Fourcast, a local addiction support centre. A counsellor, registered nurse and physician are on hand during clinic hours.
Dr. Jim McGorman works in PRHC’s emergency department and is also treating patients at RAAM.
The idea of the clinic is to see patients as quickly as possible to increase their chance of overcoming their addiction, he said.
When patients go to the emergency department, for example, they often wait to be seen and then wait for a follow up appointment with another resource. And that isn’t always effective. “We’re there to get people triaged and moving into therapy … into counselling, whatever is necessary to try to get these people the help that they need to move away or try to deal with their addiction,” McGorman said.
The hospital opened the clinic on March 5. Although it has been accepting patients, he said it wasn’t publicized until Thursday because it wasn’t fully set up.
Hours of operation are Mondays, Wednesdays and Fridays from 8 to 11 a.m.
Those hours could increase down the road, but McGorman said he’s confident they’ll be able to provide a lot of help during those times.
Funding is also limited to only cover the current hours. The clinic is backed by Ministry of Health and Central East Local Health Integration Network. They provided $200,000 toward RAAM.
The clinic is labelled as barrier-free. In this case, that means staff won’t be judgmental in any way, McGorman said.
“Whatever your issues may be, we’re not going to hold you back because of them. We’re going to try to get you the help you need in the community.”
McGorman has worked in emergency departments for 32 years and in addiction medicine for more than 15.
When it comes to treating addiction, he said it takes a team to look at all the aspects of the person’s health, rather than just one or two services.
RAAM will be working alongside other community resources such as PARN, Fourcast and methadone clinics to ensure patients are getting the care they need.
The doctor hopes the clinic will help those who’ve been falling through the cracks as they try to address their addiction problems.
“I hope that this will fill that gap and not let people be missed.”