186 waiting to enter Saint John methadone program

Workers at the methadone clinic in Saint John say the waiting list to get into the addiction program is still too long.

The methadone clinic at Ridgewood Addiction Services, administered by the Saint John Regional Hospital, has 141 clients, and 186 more are waiting to get into the program.

That was part of the news presented in the clinic's two-year program review Tuesday to the board of the hospital authority, the Atlantic Health Sciences Corporation.

"We have people desperate to get into the program," said clinic social worker Mary Gallagher. "It is just heartbreaking to have to say you know, 'I'm sorry.' It's really, really difficult to have them have hope of this treatment."

Methadone is a drug used to treat people with addictions to opiate drugs such as heroin and morphine.

Clinic co-ordinator Marj Mullin agrees that saying no is the hardest part of the job, but she said they're doing what they can to get new people in.

"We've expanded our group counselling so that we can accommodate more individuals, but at some point there needs to be continued review of the current resources, the demand that's there and some strategies to look at what we might be able to do provincially and obviously locally in Saint John to address the wait list," Mullin said.

Mullin said Saint John isn't alone. More than 600 New Brunswickers are waiting to get into a methadone program.

Aprovincial committee is looking at ways to address the long waiting list, Mullin said.