We continue our series honoring our addiction professionals by featuring Erin Newkirk, FNP. In her own words, Erin describes her journey to becoming an addiction professional:

I am a Family Nurse Practitioner working as a MAT provider. My journey to becoming a MAT provider started when a close colleague’s child died in our workplace after a struggle with addiction. I was an emergency room provider in Dayton, Ohio, an area with one of the highest rates of opioid related deaths in the US. The sense of helplessness shared with my coworkers was profound and motivated several to get trained to battle the opioid epidemic.

Becoming an addiction provider changed my professional role from just reacting to overdoses to helping prevent opioid overdoses and deaths. The considerable effort required from both the provider and the person struggling with addiction to plan and progress in recovery allows for an honesty and collaboration that is often absent in routine practice. Professionally, working in addiction has taught me how to translate the structure and goals of treatment into a language of caring that is embraced by the client. I work with the patient at the outset to visualize a future where he/she obtains healing, accomplishment and freedom. I have learned that the conversation is not just about drugs and I take that discussion outside the workplace into my personal sphere. I have learned to see setbacks with an inventor’s eye and to examine what happened and identify lessons inherent in those situations.

At YKHC, we work in the only medication-assisted treatment program in a 50,000 square mile radius in remote Alaska. We make the program accessible even in the remote bush villages of Alaska. We are off the road system. Our patients come by plane, snowmobile, ATV and boat in harsh weather and over unforgiving terrain. It is simply tough to participate in our program. It is a testament to our patients that they choose to do so despite the difficulty. When benchmarking with other programs, we consistently find that we do more with less resources, and do it well. 

I encourage my clients to be ambassadors and allow themselves the satisfaction of the positive community impact they can make, even while doing the work of recovery. We are able to bear witness to program alumni becoming colleagues and contributors in the community. I am excited that friends, family members and coworkers of patients reach out to ask questions about the program and that expectant mothers are brought into treatment with the first prenatal visit to keep our new babies healthy. It is of great comfort to our clients who are subject to requirements from the courts to be able to participate locally and stay close to family.

The specialized knowledge and experience I have gained and continue to improve on as an addiction provider afford me opportunities to serve all my patients across the spectrum of care. I’m grateful for the privilege to better care for and treat the whole person.