Wright Center Partners with Organizations to Launch Project PROGRESS

Submitted Article 

The Wright Center for Community Health, along Luzerne County Community College, The Institute, the Northeast Pennsylvania Area Health Education Center and the Wayne Pike Workforce Alliance have joined together to reduce the stigma associated with substance use disorder by connecting people in recovery with recovery-friendly employers in the new community-based, recovery-to-work program, Project PROGRESS.

Project PROGRESS is an acronym for Providing Recovery Opportunities for Growth, Education and Sustainable Success, which serves Northeast Pennsylvania counties, including Lackawanna, Luzerne, Pike, Susquehanna, Wayne and Wyoming.

Project PROGRESS is funded in part through a grant from the Appalachian Regional Commission along with financial support from the five partner organizations. “The goal of the project is to reduce the impact of stigma related to recovery on employees, employers and the region. Often people connect recovery and substance use, which is true, but think bigger. Recovery is about coming into healthy ways of being. The impact of being in recovery is incredible and demonstrates hard work. Whole communities benefit when people are in recovery,” said Meaghan Ruddy, Ph.D., senior vice president of Academic Affairs, Enterprise Assessment and Advancement, and Chief Research and Development Officer for The Wright Center for Community Health. 

In November 2020, Gov. Tom Wolf renewed for the 12th time his declaration that the opioid epidemic has placed Pennsylvania in a state health emergency. From 2015 to 2018, 1,149 people are reported to have died from opioid overdoses in the project’s six-county service area, according to OverdoseFreePA.

A community’s capacity to create anything at the community level will in large part rely on the robustness of that community’s understanding of a need and commitment to creating solutions to meet that need. Leadership and innovative organizations in the six counties of focus for Project PROGRESS are painfully aware of the impact the opioid crisis is having on our friends and neighbors,” said Dr. Ruddy.

Yet, according to Dr. Ruddy, many community members lack an understanding of addiction as a chronic illness. In addition, health care workers default to stigmatizing the language of addiction when treating patients and many employers refuse to hire people in recovery. “This is all part of a structural misunderstanding of the tragic complexity of individuals struggling with addiction, and a lack of knowledge of the fact that individuals in recovery create communities in recovery,” she said.

Project PROGRESS seeks to promote educational options for people in recovery as well as promote community comprehension of the value of recovery. Luzerne County Community College is a member of Project PROGRESS. It engages by offering training to become a certified recovery specialist (CRS). The role of a CRS is to build a strong and unique rapport with the individual in recovery based on their own lived experiences with substance use disorder. The CRS will help navigate, advocate and support individuals through their recovery journey. A CRS works to facilitate positive change and instill hope by modeling stable recovery and sharing strategies for success. 

The first CRS cohort graduated in January with 11 graduates. A second cohort with 17 graduates completed their program in late April, bringing the total number of certified recovery specialists to 28. The program includes 66 in-class hours along with 12 hours of work to be completed outside of class. The training is designed to prepare individuals for work in the behavioral health field. Upon successful completion of the class, participants move on to the application process with the Pennsylvania Certification Board.

Northeast Pennsylvania Area Health Education Center, a member of Project PROGRESS, offers training to become a community health worker. This 80-hour program is accredited through the Pennsylvania Certification Board and is designed to provide the core competencies needed for work in community-based and inpatient settings. 

Wayne Pike Workforce Alliance, also a member of Project PROGRESS, offers a recovery-to-work program that seeks to develop a strong recovery-to-work ecosystem. The Wayne Pike Workforce Alliance is focused on short-term training for immediate outcomes and employability. It uses the Comprehensive Adult Student Assessment System testing and interest assessments to ensure educational success to determine the best fit. 

For more information about Project PROGRESS, please go to ProjectPROGRESSnepa. org or email info@ProjectPROGRSSnepa.org or call 570-591-5136.

ABOUT THE WRIGHT CENTER

The Wright Center’s mission is to improve the health and welfare of the communities we serve through inclusive and responsive health services and the sustainable renewal of an inspired, competent workforce that is privileged to serve. This mission is delivered through a Graduate Medical Education Safety-Net Consortium model that engages two complementary entities: The Wright Center for Graduate Medical Education (TWCGME), The Wright Center for Community Health (TWCCH), a Federally Qualified Health Center Look Alike, and four partnering national Federally Qualified Health Centers. The shared passionate purpose of these organizations is to demonstrate an “Achievable by All” Graduate Medical Education Safety-Net Consortium model that co-creates transformational health care teams of leaders who empower people, families and communities to own and optimize their health, as well as their health care delivery and workforce development systems. Our niche is delivering world-class, innovative and responsive primary health services in the context of community-centric, incumbent and future workforce development and renewal.

TWCCH is a Federally Qualified Health Center Look-Alike with a growing network of community health centers throughout Lackawanna, Luzerne, and Wayne counties that provide safety-net, nondiscriminatory, comprehensive primary and preventive health services, including medical, dental, mental health, addiction and recovery, and Ryan White HIV services to medically underserved populations regardless of a patient’s ability to pay.

TWCGME is the nation’s largest HRSA-funded Teaching Health Center Graduate Medical Education Safety Net Consortium that is dedicated to training compassionate, highly skilled physicians in community-immersed health centers and clinical learning networks collectively striving to address our nation’s primary care physician shortage, mis-distribution and related health and health care access disparities.

The Wright Center for Patient and Community Engagement (TWCPCE) is a nonprofit that complements TWCCH and TWCGME’s mission through patient and community engagement in the delivery, enhancement and transformation of primary health care services; interprofessional workforce development; and public health improvement through education, advocacy and responsive address of the socioeconomic determinants of health that disproportionately affect underserved and rural communities. TWCPCE accomplishes its mission by providing project-based programming and organizing volunteer engagement for educational and outreach initiatives that include health fairs, blood drives, distribution of healthy nonperishable food, fresh produce, winter coats and clothing, and programs that address transportation, social isolation and more.

For more information, visit TheWrightCenter.org.

 

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