Woman’s Voice: The Lenawee Substance Abuse Prevention Coalition is a diverse group of dedicated community members united around the goal of reducing substance use in Lenawee County. LSAPC members work collaboratively to engage and educate the community in order to promote a healthy Lenawee.
Kathy Williams: This is Kathy Williams and with me right now is Jordana Latozas. She is a nurse practitioner. But the topic we’re going to be talking about tonight is a group called the Recovery Mobile Clinic, and Jordana is the president of that group, Jordana. What exactly is the recovery mobile clinic?
Jordana Latozas: First of all, thank you for having me here, Kathy. The Recovery Mobile Clinic is just what it says. It is a mobile clinic. So we function out of a 30-foot RV moving around from site to site. And our primary focus is on addiction medicine. So we have taken addiction medicine on wheels focusing on opiate and alcohol addiction in the community.
Kathy Williams: Well, I would imagine over 2020 and probably still you have a lot more people taking advantage of your services.
Jordana Latozas: Yes. The company was established in February of 2020. Great year, right, to start a new company? But it has proven to kind of be a blessing in disguise to have started this year. What we’ve been able to see is that with the pandemic, a lot of community support systems for those struggling with addiction where we’re compromised, we weren’t able to go to groups and meet. So there was a huge need for additional support.
Kathy Williams: Well, and not only for the people who were already in the system, but so many more were eligible for extra help. I mean, a lot of us suffered from depression and leaned on things we shouldn’t have leaned on, correct?
Jordana Latozas: Unfortunately, with mental health, there comes a high potential for substance abuse, whether that’s cigarettes, food, alcohol or opiates. And we did see a significant increase in substance abuse during the pandemic and following. Alcohol percentages just from sales alone were up 300% this year, online mostly. And then our overdose rate for opiates was up 30%. You know, unfortunately, what that represents is that all of the progress we made in the last five years has been undone.
Kathy Williams: Exactly.
Jordana Latozas: So we really need to start refocusing on not just the problem, but the solutions to this problem.
Kathy Williams: Yeah, I mean, people who probably had relapses, which isn’t uncommon, but to not have the services available to help them before they made that deep dive, that that had to compromise a lot of people.
Jordana Latozas: Absolutely. So what the Recovery Mobile Clinic is trying to do is make treatment options feasible. By being mobile, we’re able to go directly to where patients are. We frequent shelters, parole offices, counseling offices, primary care, community centers such as churches, three quarter houses, transitional housing. So we try to go to where the people already are.
Kathy Williams: OK.
Jordana Latozas: You know, adding the pandemic on to job loss. And, you know, everything else that kind of steamrolled into this – transportation is an issue. So what we’re trying to do is make it easy to obtain help, because if it’s easy, then we have a higher propensity to maintain.
Kathy Williams: To be successful too. Yeah. For everyone. So what made you leave your position to start a nonprofit addiction clinic like this?
Jordana Latozas: I’ve been in addiction medicine for over six years and what we saw prior pandemic was that transportation was an issue. We would lose around 30% of our patients because they couldn’t get to us or they couldn’t get a ride. Now you add pandemic levels to that and all of a sudden an Uber and Lyft are gone. People don’t want to take people places.
Kathy Williams: Right.
Jordana Latozas: You know, it definitely increased the transportation loss. So I said to myself, we’ve got to do better than this. Transportation is a solvable issue. And if I can take that clinic to where people are, we have a better chance of giving individuals a shot.
Kathy Williams: There you go.
Jordana Latozas: And that’s what we’re trying to do, is give them their life back and give them the tools to do that.
Kathy Williams: Exactly. Well, and that’s one of the things that I think is wonderful about your your mobile clinic is you’re giving people opportunity. And sometimes opportunity creates self-decisions that are easily more possible rather than just thinking about, wow, it’s right there. Let me check it out, if nothing else. So what can a person expect then when they arrive at the mobile clinic?
Jordana Latozas: Well, the mobile clinic being an RV can sometimes be a little bit off-setting to some people. It’s outside of the traditional doctor’s office. But once you get through the door, it is a doctor’s office. We get you into our little waiting room, we check you in, and then we pull you back into the clinic itself. We have a fully functioning staff. You usually have two to three people that you’ll see medical assistance and then myself, the nurse practitioner. We will ask for insurance information, if you have it and you know, like a normal doctor’s office flow, most people feel very comfortable once they’ve actually gone through the process.
Kathy Williams: Well, it’s great that you do take the different insurances. And so, you know, to find out more about the clinic itself. Is there a social media presence or a website?
Jordana Latozas: Yep, we have a presence on LinkedIn and Facebook. It’s just entitled The Recovery Mobile Clinic. Our website is www.RecoveryMobileClinic.com. And, on there is a list of all of our services, not just the addiction services with Vivitrol and everything else we do, but also with just basic medical services. We do offer COVID testing. We do offer COVID screening, um, flu vaccines, tetanus vaccines, basic medical care. OK, so we are also open to the community in general, anybody that needs access to medicine
Kathy Williams: So they can schedule an appointment through the website, but they can also if need be, you do take walk-ups.
Jordana Latozas: Yes. Scheduling an appointment via phone. Unfortunately, we don’t have the ability to schedule on our website. But what you do want to find out what the website is, where we are that day being mobile, we do move around a lot. So we’re in this area, Lenawee, every second and fourth Thursday of every single month. But then we also cover a large area of southeast Michigan. So we do move around a lot.
Kathy Williams: OK, great. Well, I certainly appreciate all the hard work that you’re doing. That’s one of the things that the Lenawee Substance Abuse Prevention Coalition is so passionate about. And so we appreciate that you’re helping to bring some of these solutions to our neighbors.
Jordana Latozas: Absolutely. It’s a pleasure to be involved.
Woman’s Voice: Thank you for listening. This information has been provided by the Lenawee Substance Abuse Prevention Coalition. New messages air on the first and third Monday of each month at 6:15 p.m. You can listen to this program as a podcast under the audio tab on WLEN.com and listen and gather more information at DrugPreventionLenawee.com.
