“There's No Supports for People in Addiction, But There's No Supports for Everyone Else Around Them as Well”: A Qualitative Study With Parents and Other Family Members Supporting Youth and Young Adults

Abstract

Objectives: Harms from opioid use and opioid-related overdose death have continued to rise in Western Canada, constituting a public health emergency. While the presence of family support is essential to improving health outcomes for people who use drugs, affected family members continue to face considerable challenges in accessing timely and appropriate supports and services, both for their loved ones, and for themselves when needed. The overarching aim of our qualitative project was to employ qualitative methodology to understand family experiences with healthcare and treatment services when supporting a young person seeking treatment for use of opioids and/or other substance use.Methods: To understand the family experience of providing support for a youth or young adult who has experienced harms from opioids and other co-occurring substance use interviews (n = 17) were carried out in Alberta, Manitoba, and Saskatchewan, with adult family members (mostly mothers; 12/17) of youth and young adults who had experienced harms due to opioids and other substance use, including overdose death. Qualitative interview data was analyzed using Reflexive Thematic Analysis to distill themes.Results: We identified the following key themes from our analysis: (1) The challenges and stigma encountered when seeking care for a loved one using substances, and (2) The lack of support to address family member mental health needs. In addition to access and system navigation

What features of drug treatment programs help, or not, with access? a qualitative study of the perspectives of family members and community-based organization staff in Atlantic Canada

“…PWUS in our previous research from Phase One of the study identified a number of similar features that were helpful (e.g., quick access, supportive staff ) and not helpful (e.g., needing a phone to obtain access, wait times, limited program availability) [21]. Many of the policies and practices highlighted by family members/family of choice and CBO staff and presented in this current paper on Phase Two data, have also been identified in the literature for many years [27,28,31,40,41].…”

“…The key purpose of our qualitative research was to understand, based on the perspective of two groups (family members/family of choice of PWUS and communitybased organization (CBO) staff who work with PWUS), features of drug treatment programs that are helpful or not helpful for PWUS when trying to access or accessing government-funded treatment programs in Atlantic Canada. There is some existing research on the support which family members/family of choice and CBO staff sometimes provide to PWUS when they are seeking or in treatment [25][26][27], but relatively limited research on these groups' perspectives of features of drug treatment programs that are helpful or not. The limited literature that does exist on family perspectives points to quick access as being helpful [28], and not helpful features include limited availability of services, cost of services, and wait times [27][28][29].…”

“…There is some existing research on the support which family members/family of choice and CBO staff sometimes provide to PWUS when they are seeking or in treatment [25][26][27], but relatively limited research on these groups' perspectives of features of drug treatment programs that are helpful or not. The limited literature that does exist on family perspectives points to quick access as being helpful [28], and not helpful features include limited availability of services, cost of services, and wait times [27][28][29]. Most of this literature, however, centres on youth treatment programs [27,29,30].…”

“…The limited literature that does exist on family perspectives points to quick access as being helpful [28], and not helpful features include limited availability of services, cost of services, and wait times [27][28][29]. Most of this literature, however, centres on youth treatment programs [27,29,30]. CBO staff perspectives on drug treatment programs are also relatively underexplored [31], and there is specifically a knowledge gap based on treatment programs in Atlantic Canada.…”

Accidental substance-related acute toxicity deaths among youth in Canada: a descriptive analysis of a national chart review study of coroner and medical examiner data

“…Previous research has highlighted challenges in opioid-related services for youth, including gaps in the continuum of care, inaccessibility of services, stigma, lack of respect for youth autonomy and a lack of family supports. 13 - 16 Opioid agonist therapy prescription rates and residential treatment rates have been declining among Ontario youth since 2014, despite increasing opioid-related youth ATDs. 6 About half of the youth who died from opioid-related acute toxicity in Ontario had an opioid use disorder.…”