Amy Saunders, director for Marshall’s Center of Excellence for Recovery and co-chair of the university’s Substance Use Recovery Coalition, and Dr. Marianna Linz, chair of Marshall University’s psychology department, visited the Atlanta headquarters following a request by CDC officials who had traveled to Huntington earlier this year.
“We were very honored to be invited to this event, where we presented many of the solutions we are using in West Virginia to address addiction,” Saunders said. “We are truly a national model that can be scaled for use in communities around the country.”
In addition, Linz said the CDC staff provided a wonderful opportunity to assist the university in understanding patterns of the opioid crisis as they affect children and families.
“Their sincere support will allow us to better understand the confluence of factors that lead to the current crisis, to compare it to past crisis patterns, to assess the impacts of current prevention/intervention efforts, and to be better prepared for future challenges,” Linz said.
Multiple areas around the issue of addiction were discussed at the visit.
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Photo: Dr. Robert Redfield (center), director of the Centers for Disease Control, is pictured with Marshall University representatives Amy Saunders (third from left) and Dr. Marianna Linz (third from right) during a recent visit to the CDC’s Atlanta headquarters for a discussion on addiction and its impact on families. Also pictured are West Virginia state representatives Amy Tolliver (second from left), Denise Smith (second from right) and Sara Sanders (right), and Dr. Coleen Boyle, (far left), director of the CDC’s National Center on Birth Defects and Developmental Disabilities.