New Research to Measure the Impact of Overdose Prevention Centers

May 09, 2023 - New York University (NYU) Langone Health and Brown University’s School of Public Health have been awarded over $5 million from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (NIDA), part of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), to evaluate the impact of overdose prevention centers (OPCs) on drug overdose in the US. 

According to the press release, OPCs are community-based models where people can use previously obtained controlled substances in a monitored setting, which allows medical staff to intervene in the event of an overdose or another adverse event. OPCs can also help individuals who use controlled substances with additional services, such as harm reduction, addiction treatment, medical care, mental health treatment, and basic needs services for food and housing. 

Some public health experts have argued that OPCs are an essential part of the US strategy to address the overdose crisis, citing that the facilities are associated with benefits for both the individuals who use them and the surrounding communities, such as reduced overdose deaths, substance use–related harms, public drug consumption, and crime.  

NYU and Brown’s research will center around the first publicly recognized OPCs in the US: two sites in New York City, and one site set to open in Providence, Rhode Island in 2024. The researchers aim to enroll 1,000 study participants in both New York City and Providence who are over the age of 18, already use drugs, and have visited an OPC or harm reduction services site in the past.  

By doing so, the research teams hope to gather critical data that characterizes the role these OPCs may play in addressing overdoses and improving public health. 

“We have an unprecedented opportunity to study the first publicly recognized overdose prevention centers in the country across two different states, as well as the impact on the communities in which they operate,” said Magdalena Cerdá, DrPH, one of the study’s two lead investigators who serves as a professor in the Department of Population Health at NYU Langone and director of its Center for Opioid Epidemiology and Policy, in the press release. “This research is urgently needed to inform policies that can best support public health, as more jurisdictions across the country consider implementing OPCs.” 

Over the next four years, researchers will conduct individual- and community-level evaluations of the three sites.  

According to the press release, these evaluations will help determine whether study participants visiting the OPCs experience lower rates of nonfatal or fatal overdoses, drug-related health problems, and emergency department visits, in addition to whether these individuals are more likely to seek treatment for substance use disorder (SUD). 

Evaluations will also consider the community impact of OPCs, such as whether neighborhoods surrounding the facilities experience greater changes in overdoses, arrests, and economic activity than similar neighborhoods that do not have an OPC. The operational costs and potential cost savings associated with OPC use will also be measured. 

“The overdose crisis has touched every community across America. From coast to coast and across age, gender, and race/ethnicity—people are dying,” said Brandon DL Marshall, PhD, professor of epidemiology at the Brown University School of Public Health and the founding director of the People, Place & Health Collective at Brown University. “This groundbreaking study will help us determine whether and how OPCs are an effective public health tool as part of a more compassionate, evidence-based response to this crisis in the [US].” 

The study is part of the NIH Harm Reduction Research Network, a national effort to help test harm reduction strategies to address overdose deaths.