Community pharmacies as access points for addiction treatment

Abstract

Background: There is growing interest in utilizing community pharmacies to support opioid abuse prevention and addiction treatment efforts. However, it is unknown whether the placement of community pharmacies is conducive to taking on such a role.

Objective: To examine the distribution of community pharmacies in Wisconsin and its relationship with the location of addiction treatment facilities and opioid-related overdose events in rural and urban areas.

Methods: The total number of opioid-related overdose deaths and crude death rates per 100,000 population were determined for each county in Wisconsin. Substance abuse treatment facilities were identified in each county to estimate access to formal addiction treatment. A list of pharmacies in the state was screened to identify community pharmacies in each county. Descriptive statistics and Pearson correlation coefficients were used to describe the distribution of and relationships between county-level opioid-related overdose death rates and the number of treatment facilities and community pharmacies in the state.

Results: Wisconsin has 72 counties, of which 45 (62.5%) are classified as rural. Although the number of opioid-related overdose deaths was highly concentrated in urban areas, crude death rates per 100,000 population were similar in urban and rural areas. Rural counties were significantly less likely to have formal substance abuse treatment facilities (r = -.42, P = .00) or community pharmacies (r = -.44, P = .00) compared to urban counties. However, community pharmacies were more prevalent and more likely to be located in rural counties with higher rates of opioid-related overdose deaths than substance abuse treatment facilities. All but 1 of the 14 counties without a formal substance abuse treatment facility had access to 1 or more community pharmacies.

Conclusions: Community pharmacies are ideally located in areas that could be used to support medication-assisted addiction treatment efforts, particularly in rural areas lacking formal substance abuse treatment facilities.

Keywords: Access to care; Drug abuse; Pharmacy; Policy; Rural.