An overwhelming response to the second workshop CHWCMR Community Champions saving life to respond to

Pierce County is the second county with a high percentage of the dead for the opioids. Community Health Workers for Migrants and Refugees is training Community Champions to deal with this crisis as part of the funded of the 2019 COF Barclay-Giel Seed Grant. More than 36 leaders of Pierce County community met at East Family Support Center to talk about how to rapidly respond to opioid overdoses in the streets; how to discard any prescribed and unused opioids, how to know what are pain killers are opioids and why we should talk about them with your family and communities. This is the second workshop, following the one we conduct on Granger, Yakima with the participation of 23 community representatives of Grant County, Yakima, and Tri-cites. The two workshops were conducted by Drs. Ileana Ponce-Gonzalez and Michael Parchman.

CHWCMR is eager to continue to train our communities in this important topic, but we are running out of funding. We are looking for funding opportunities to support our Community Champions to save a life in their communities. So far, we have already trained 59 community champions in the places, where they are most needed in Washington State.