The healing arts of recovery from the despair of addiction – Richard Asinof
by Richard Asinof, ConvergenceRI, contributing writer Photo: Richard Asinof, Sandy Valentine, the executive director of RICARES, and Ian Knowles, the program manager of RICARES. The recovery community in Rhode Island has been blessed with many strong leaders over the past two decades, from the late Jim Gillen and Tom Coderre to Linda Hurley , Colleen Ndoye and Abbie Knapton . The leaders have often cobbled together innovative responses to the ever-changing dynamics of the ongoing opioid epidemic – from launching the Rally4Recovery to creating a program of peer recovery coaches at hospital emergency rooms, from launching a drop-in teen center to developing a mobile van intervention in order to meet people where they are. And, the latest innovation-to-be: the launch of a pilot harm reduction center in Providence. The shape of the epidemic crisis has also morphed. What began as an epidemic stoked by unscrupulous pharmaceutical companies pushing addictive prescrip...