February 5, 2024
The addiction provider at St. Peter's Health, Dr. Kyle Moore, joined a Helena Hustle podcast and shared his experiences with family medicine and addiction medicine. Give it a listen!
January 9, 2024
As part of their commitment towards overdose prevention, St. John's Health developed this naloxone pamphlet. It is widely distributed throughout the pain clinic and for patients receiving opioid prescriptions following surgery.
December 20, 2023
Looking towards sustainability, RAIN Phase 2 is being discussed with this notice of funding opportunity (NOFO).
November 30, 2023
Following a community board meeting with Madison Memorial Health, RCORP sent helpful resources for finding a Botvin replacement. It suggests varying levels of certified programs, implementation costs, and helps specify what program outcomes are desired. Learn more here!
November 2-4, 2023
For the 47th annual AMERSA conference, a group from the University of Utah traveled to DC and presented a variety of projects. Dr. Alan Taylor Kelley, our UNHS facilitator, presented RAIN with this poster. Congrats to all that presented!
October 10-11, 2023
Following the RAIN Conference, the 9th annual University of Utah Regional Affiliate Symposium took place at the Rice Eccles stadium. Our project director, Cole Fordham, tabled the event and advertised the program's success. To view our most recent brochure with information on RAIN, click here.
October 9, 2023
On 10/9/23, RAIN had its second ever virtual conference with all sites. This was a fantastic opportunity for sites to share previous accomplishments within the grant, current objectives, and future goals for the final year. We deeply appreciated all site participation and celebrating the history of RAIN. To view what was presented during the conference, click here.
September 13, 2023
Our partner in Rexburg Idaho, Madison Memorial Hospital, is awaiting community board approval for a new drug awareness and prevention program. The previous program, Botvin, was successfully implemented in the 22-23 school year but was not well received by students or faculty. The top replacement choice, Keepin' It Real, will be decided upon and implemented in the 24-25 school year.
September 6, 2023
Dr. Taylor Kelley and Cole Fordham visited UNHS to discuss a unique grant funding opportunity. Through an organization called NCREW (Native Collective Research Effort to Enhance Wellness), this grant is funded through the National Institutes of Health (NIH) and the HEAL initiative. This is an exciting opportunity to build research infrastructure at UNHS while addressing overdose, substance use, mental health, and pain. Read more about the research opportunity announcement here.
July 25, 2023
Dr. Adam Gordon visited St. Peters to help emphasize the necessity and importance of a Licensed Addiction Counselor (LAC) in the addiction clinic. With a collaboration from Dr. Kyle Moore at St. Peters, this visit helped to create a funded position and current efforts are focused on finding the right candidate. This is an exciting step towards expanding addiction services!
June-August, 2023
In response to a community needs assessment, Madison Memorial Hospital has hired an Outpatient Nurse working closely with mental health management in an offsite clinic.
ER Bridge Program - Over the summer, our partners in Rexburg trained 3 social workers to be Patient Navigators. These individuals help with transition of care for patients (ER to primary or other resources)!
May 22, 2023
One of our RAIN Facilitators, Dr. Taylor Kelley, has continued working with the Utah Navajo Health System (UNHS) on their Grant Writing workshop. This workshop was developed at UNHS with the help of RAIN and has successfully submitted for multiple grants. A recent application for a SAMHSA grant was submitted, read more about the NOFO here.
April 13th-16th, 2023
St. Peters Addiction Clinic/ER staff attended a team building opportunity at an ASAM (Innovations in Addiction Medicine and Science) conference. This OUD staff collaboration and training conference was highly valued by our team at St. Peters.
Pictured: Kyle Moore, Rochelle Quist, Christine Bussey
Not pictured: Tiffany Kniepkamp, Andrew Michel, Amanda Nield, Amy Geiger
March 20, 2023
Dr. Adam Gordon gave two well attended presentations at St. John's Hospital where many physicians and staff members attended and learned about problems with Substance Abuse and medications to treat Substance Use Disorder.
Pictured: Dr. Audrey Jones and former project director, Kody Hafen.
August 22, 2022
Tyler Haskel, a summer intern with the Rural and Underserved Utah Training Experience (RUUTE), has completed his internship and presented the RAIN project at the Summer Symposium here at the University of Utah. Here is a copy of the poster he presented.
May 4, 2022
"This week it's RAINing and pouring! UNHS has discussed a need for MSW licensing tutoring with our RAIN team. We are lucky to have great team members here at the University of Utah who are connected with great educators! We look forward to collaborating with the BYU Social Work department in order to create a network of tutoring and resources oppertunities for UNHS!"
April 26, 2022
"There is 100% chance of RAIN this week! It was great to get out in person to meet with the Madison Memorial community group this week! While we were in Rexburg we were able to meet with their middle school health educators, we hope they are as excited as we are to implement the Botvin program this fall! St. John's is interested in looking at alternative treatments for pain management! We look forward to seeing their team in person next month!"
April 13, 2022
"The storms are rolling in this week! We are on the road! With the decline of COVID19 in our service areas the RAIN Initiative team is traveling this spring. We are excited to visit our RAIN sites in person and to have the opportunity to meet their community members!"
March 31, 2022
"Fair weather is blowing in this week! St. Peter's underwent their accreditation survey, we wish their site the very best of luck! St. John's had been focusing on creating educational materials for their patients this month. These brochures will focus on educating patients on how to use nasal Narcan and how to recognize the signs of opioid overdose."
March 22, 2022
"Spring is in the the air this week! This month we had the pleasure of meeting with the Montana Primary Care Association! They are funded by the SAMHSA State Opioid Response (SOR) grant. Their initiative is to advance integrated behavioral health and MOUD into primary care, FQHC, hospital, and ED settings. We hope to form a collaboration with their team and the St. Peter's ED team!"
March 01, 2022
"It's raining cats and dogs this week! The Madison Memorial comminity stakeholder group has decided to use Botvin Lifeskills for their substance abuse education program in their middle and high schools! Our RAIN was able to connect with the Preventional Specialist for Utah schools in order to learn more about how Utah uses the Botvin progam. We are very excited to work wiht Madison Memorail and the Utah Prevention Specialist to impliment Botvin into the Rexburg schools this fall!"
February 16, 2022
"A brisk storm front is moving in this week! UNHS completed their education brochures this month! We are excited to have these education materials out in their community!"
January 28, 2022
"This week the cold front is packing a powerful punch! At the January RAIN ROUNDUP, we learned about how "words matter" in the language of addiction! Visit our website to watch the recording for past sessions and to download the presentation slides. We are excited to congratulate UNHS on their new grant from Indian Health Services. With this new grant they will be able to hire staff and expand their behavioral health services! Madison Memorial is making major rain storms in their community meetings, this month the stakeholders discussed SUD/OUD education needs in their middle and high schools. Our RAIN team is excited to help facilitate their efforts!"
January 17, 2022
"Old man winter is bringing in the storms this week! Madison Memorial Hospital held their first community stakeholder meeting this month! Their stakeholders include members of their local law enforcement and educators. We look forward to the collaboration this will spark! St. John's is looking into opioid safety this month. They plan to create materials to educate both their patients and providers! UNHS is also interested in edcuation this month, they are gathering information to create patient brochures on alcohol and methamphetamine misuse."
December 21, 2021
"This week we'll have plenty of snow to make snow cones! At our second RAIN ROUNDUP we learned about "how to be an efficient team" and peer navigator approaches to addiction prevention, treatment, and recovery! We hope everyone has a happy and safe holiday!"
December 15, 2021
“It's umbrella weather this week! St. Peter's is sharing their umbrella with their ED and first responders! They will be focusing on leveraging their existing relationships in order to enhance how their team's capability to respond to those with SUD/OUD. Madison Memorial is offering an umbrella to their social work and media groups. There are many projects ongoing at Madison Memorial for SUD/OUD so their team is looking forward to expanding their network!"
December 2, 2021
“This past week we had a stampede of storms on radar! The RAIN Initiative hosted our first monthly RAIN Roundup on Tuesday November 23rd. We are excited to have all of our sites engaging in this initiative! Yesterday the RAIN Initiative team met with Intermountain to discuss their HRSA RCORP III Implementation Project (the same grant as RAIN!). The Intermountain team has big plans to tackle SUD/OUD prevention, treatment, and recovery in central Utah. Our team is looking forward to creating a collaboration with Intermountain!”
November 18, 2021
“The forecast for this week is chilly with a chance of RAIN! Since our last update, the RAIN Initiative has held mentor meetings with several of the RAIN sites. With these meetings, our sites are starting to choose which core activity they want to implement first. We look forward to seeing our site's strategies come to life! Don’t forget our monthly RAIN Roundup is next week on Tuesday, November 23rd!”
November 4, 2021
“The forecast for this week is chilly with a chance of RAIN! Since our last update, the RAIN Initiative has held mentor meetings with several of the RAIN sites. With these meetings, our sites are starting to choose which core activity they want to implement first. We look forward to seeing our site's strategies come to life! Don’t forget our monthly RAIN Roundup is next week on Tuesday, November 23rd!”