A bitter pill: Northern looks at prescription drug addiction

Montana State University-Northern kicked off four days of activities to raise awareness about prescription drug and opiate abuse Monday night with an opening reception for an art exhibit at the Vande Bogart Library.

"Bitter Pill: Montana Lives Affected By RX Abuse," is a traveling art exhibit featuring more than 30 pieces by professional and amateur Montana artists meant to document experiences and views on prescription and opiate drug addiction and recovery.

Renee Nelson, an intelligence research specialist with the Drug Enforcement Agency's pharmaceutical diversion squad in Billings and a curator with the traveling exhibit, said the exhibit will next be on display in Kalispell, Bozeman and Moscow, Idaho.

Nelson said of the 55,403 deaths from drug overdoses nationally in 2015, 43,091 or 60 percent were from an opioid-related narcotics. She said that the most common pharmaceutical drugs listed on death certificates are methadone, a drug that was meant to cure opioid addiction; oxycodone, a painkiller often referred to as "hillbilly heroin" in the southeastern U.S. and hydrocodone, another pain medication.

Nelson, a mother of two, said that the statistic she finds most troubling is that every 19 minutes a baby is born who is addicted to opioids, many of them end up experiencing the side effects of withdrawal soon after they are born.  

"For me, I have a young son and I can't imagine that his first experience would be to withdraw from drugs," she said.

She said that babies who go through withdrawal scream and shake. The side effects from withdrawal typically last hours but can also last days and weeks.

"If you never Googled this, Google this you will cry," she said. "It is sad to see these babies go through withdrawal."

Babies going through withdrawal influenced Nelson's own piece, she said, a collage made up of words and images from pamphlets at her DEA office, a poster advertising prescription drug buy backs and rice paper.

Shown among the words is a pencil drawing of a baby in the fetal position.

Nelson said she believes that education about the problem is key, starting at a young age to teach about what prescription drugs and opioids are for and not for.  

"We need to talk to our kids, and I mean our first-graders, our second-graders, because we are getting information that kids that are that young are taking pills to school," she said.  

After taking attendees around to several pieces, Nelson said she had been searching for a quote before the presentation that would stick with people.

She said words on one drawing of an arm and the words addiction written in a syringe, seemed appropriate.

"At any given moment, you have the power to say, 'This is not how my story is going to end,'" Nelson said.

Resolve Montana, a state program aimed at educating the public about prescription drug abuse; the Drug Enforcement Agency, the office of the Montana Attorney General, and the District of Montana's U.S. Attorney's office are the organizations behind the exhibit.

Nelson said the program began collecting pieces from across Montana in December 2015 before the art was first displayed in Billings in May.

She said the exhibit, which has been to multiple cities throughout Montana since and to a conference in Minneapolis, is meant to raise discussion about the issue of prescription drug and opioid addiction.